Zelenskyy to visit London for talks before Putin and Trump 'summit'

Ukraine's president, Volodmyr Zelenskyy, will travel to London on Friday for a meeting of the so-called "coalition of the willing" before an expected summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin in Hungary, amid mounting European disquiet over Ukraine's exclusion from the Budapest meeting.

- Peter Beaumont

Posting on social media, Zelenskyy said the aim of the London meeting would be to win security guarantees for Kyiv, adding that there would be "many meetings and negotiations in Europe" this week.

The London meeting follows Ukraine's disappointment at the outcome of last week's meeting between Zelenskyy and Trump in Washington, where Ukraine's call for Tomahawk cruise missiles was rebuffed following a two-hour-long phone call between Trump and Putin as the Ukrainian leader was flying to the US.

Following the call, Trump once again reverted to echoing Moscow's maximalist demands, including that Ukraine give up the key Donbas region. Reports over the weekend said Trump had privately urged Zelenskyy to accept Russia's terms for ending the war during a fractious White House meeting, warning that Putin had said he would "destroy" Ukraine if it did not agree.

The announcement of the London meeting came as the EU's chief diplomat, Kaja Kallas, warned that while she believed Trump was "sincere" in his desire for peace, "nothing can come out of these meetings if Ukraine or Europe is not part of it", adding that pressuring Ukraine was "not the right approach" to end Russia's war.