A “really important week” in peace talks is coming up after President Donald Trump met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the Vatican over the weekend amid the funeral for Pope Francis, according to the Trump administration’s top diplomat.
Russia and Ukraine are “closer in general than they’ve been any time in the last three years” to reaching an end to their war, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet The Press,” although he conceded the two sides have not yet reached a resolution.
This past week, Rubio told moderator Kristen Welker, “has really been about figuring out how close are these sides really, and are they close enough that this merits a continued investment of our time as a mediator in this regard.”
Rubio said he thinks it would be “silly” to set a specific date for a peace agreement. “I can just tell you that almost 100 days into this presidency, the president has dedicated a tremendous amount of time and energy to this, and we think we brought the sides closer than they’ve been in a very long time,” he added.
“But we’re not there yet, and it needs to start happening,” Rubio continued. “We need to start — I think this is going to be a very critical week. This week is going to be a really important week in which we have to make a determination about whether this is an endeavor that we want to continue to be involved in, or if it’s time to sort of focus on some other issues that are equally, if not more, important in some cases, but we want to see it happen. There are reasons to be optimistic, but there are reasons to be realistic, of course, as well. We’re close, but we’re not close enough.”
The White House said the meeting at the Vatican was “very productive,” a sign of progress after an explosive confrontation between Trump and Zelensky at the White House earlier this year. Trump also criticized Russia for continuing to attack Ukraine. He suggested that Russian President Vladimir Putin needs to be “dealt with differently” moving forward. All that happened after Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff traveled to Moscow on Friday to meet with Putin and discuss ending the war.
One major point of contention has been territory. While Zelensky insisted that Ukraine will not “legally recognize” Russia’s occupation of Crimea, Trump said that Crimea will “stay with Russia.”
In an interview on “Sunday Morning Futures,” National Security Advisor Mike Waltz emphasized both Russia and Ukraine need a desire to end the war for the years-long conflict to come to a close when anchor Maria Bartiromo asked him if Zelensky understands that he’s likely not going to get more land back.
“There’s been a number of discussions of territory, of what they need to make sure that this war never continues, that it is permanent,” Waltz said. “We have talked to our European partners, who you saw the images of both Starmer from the United Kingdom and Macron from France, that Europe has to step up. I know that you have ambassador Whitaker, our new NATO ambassador, who’s fantastic coming on, on talking about how the Europeans need to take the lead in the future.”
He added: “All of those things are key parts of the discussion with both Zelensky and with Putin. And next is to drive both sides to the table, but they both have to want it. And the president has expressed his frustrations in whether both sides genuinely want to end this war. But he is determined to have the United States of America and him — I will just say this: the current leader of NATO, who was here this week, said only President Trump could break the deadlock that we saw 100 days ago under the Biden administration. And he’s done just that, starting with his call with both Putin and Zelensky just a few months ago.”
Uncertainty also rests with a rare earth minerals deal between the United States and Ukraine that has been discussed for months but has yet to be finalized.
The agreement is “going to get done,” Waltz said. “The negotiators were working hard over the weekend. That is first and foremost on both [Treasury] Secretary Bessent and the president’s mind. It’s going to get done, Maria. The president is determined to make it so.”
