Donald Trump said he will speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the start of next week as he pledged to stop the 'bloodbath' in Ukraine.
The President said he would speak with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and various members of Nato afterwards.
Trump wrote on his Truth Social page: "The subjects of the call will be, stopping the 'bloodbath' that is killing, on average, more than 5000 Russian and Ukrainian soldiers a week, and trade.
"Hopefully it will be a productive day, a ceasefire will take place, and this very violent war, a war that should have never happened, will end. God bless us all!!!"
Trump said he would speak to the Russian President next week
REUTERSNegotiations about a potential ceasefire have been ongoing in Istanbul between Russian and Ukranian negotiators.
Moscow has shown little inclination to make concessions in the Ukraine conflict.
Russian negotiators at the Istanbul peace talks on Friday demanded Ukraine pull its troops out of all Ukrainian regions claimed by Moscow before they would agree to a ceasefire, a senior Ukrainian official familiar with the talks told reporters.
The talks lasted only one hour and 40 minutes, and yielded an agreement to trade 1,000 prisoners of war on each side. The two countries have not specified when that would happen.
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS FRON THE FRONTLINE IN UKRAINE
Putin's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov had stressed that Russia 'cannot give up' Crimea earlier this weekREUTERSRussian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke by telephone to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and welcomed the "positive role" of the United States in helping to secure a resumption of talks between Russia and Ukraine.
"(Lavrov) confirmed Moscow's readiness to continue joint work with American colleagues in this context," the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Ukraine and Western governments, including the US, have demanded that Russia agree to an immediate, unconditional ceasefire lasting at least 30 days.
A Ukrainian source said Moscow's negotiators had demanded the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson and Luhansk regions of Ukraine, with a ceasefire to take place only after that.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov GettyThe source said that and other demands went beyond the terms of a draft peace deal that the United States proposed last month after consultations with Moscow.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov declined to comment on the Ukrainian account, saying talks should be conducted "absolutely behind closed doors".
He said the next steps would be to carry out the prisoner exchange and conduct further work between the two sides. Peskov said it was possible that President Vladimir Putin could meet Zelensky , but only if "certain agreements" were reached, which he did not specify.
Zelenskiy had challenged Putin earlier in the week to meet him in person, an offer the Russian leader ignored.
