Donald Trump has claimed no peace deal will happen between Russia and Ukraine unless there is a direct meeting between himself and Vladimir Putin.
The US President was speaking addressed the war in Ukraine before landing in Abu Dhabi for the final leg of his Middle East tour.
It comes as Putin rejected a challenge to meet face-to-face with President Volodymyr Zelensky in Turkey earlier today, instead sending a second-tier delegation to planned peace talks.
Meanwhile, Ukraine's president said his defence minister would head up Kyiv's team.
Vladimir Putin and Zelensky were set to meet
Reuters
Russia's President Vladimir Putin chairs a meeting with senior officials
Reuters
Donald Trump told reporters ahead of his diplomatic visit to Abu Dhabi: "Look, nothing’s going to happen until Putin and I get together.
"Obviously, he wasn’t going to go. He was going to go, but he thought I was going to go...He wasn’t going if I wasn’t there and I don’t believe anything’s going to happen, whether you like it or not, until he and I get together, but we’re going to have to get it solved because too many people are dying."
The sentiment was echoed by his Secretary of State and former Republican rival Marco Rubio, who said: "It’s my assessment that I don’t think we’re going to have a breakthrough here until the President (Trump) and President Putin interact directly on this topic
"I hope I’m wrong. I hope I’m 100 per cent wrong...I hope the news tomorrow morning is there’s a ceasefire. But it’s not my assessment."
LATEST FROM THE FRONTLINE IN UKRAINE:
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy
Reuters
A drone view shows the ruins of buildings in the abandoned town of Marinka (Maryinka), which was destroyed in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict in the Donetsk region
Reuters
The Ukrainian President said Putin's decision not to attend but to send what he called a "decorative" line-up showed the Russian leader was not serious about ending the war.
Zelensky told reporters in Ankara: "We can't be running around the world looking for Putin. I feel disrespect from Russia. No meeting time, no agenda, no high-level delegation - this is personal disrespect. To Erdogan, to Trump."
Meanwhile, Moscow accused Ukraine of trying "to put on a show" around the talks.
When asked if Putin would join talks at some future point, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: "What kind of participation will be required further, at what level, it is too early to say now."
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov Getty
Vladimir Medinsky, head of the Russian delegation in Istanbul for potential peace talks with Ukraine
Reuters
The Russian delegation is led by presidential adviser and key Putin ally Vladimir Medinsky, a former Culture Minister who has overseen the rewriting of history textbooks to reflect Moscow's narrative on the war.
Medinsky said: "The task of direct negotiations with the Ukrainian side is sooner or later to achieve long-term peace by eliminating the basic root causes of the conflict."
With Russian forces now in control of close to a fifth of Ukraine, the Kremlin has held fast to its longstanding demands for Kyiv to cede territory, abandon its Nato membership ambitions and become a neutral country.
Ukraine rejects these terms as tantamount to capitulation and is seeking guarantees of its future security from world powers, especially the United States.
