There are no plans for U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin to meet "in the immediate future," a senior White House official said on October 21, days after Trump had indicated that another summit was being arranged with his Russian counterpart.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov also have no plans to meet in person, the official told reporters, adding that a call between the two men was "productive."
The clarification comes amid reports that preparatory talks between the two countries’ top diplomats had stalled, likely delaying the proposed meeting.
Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov said that no such meeting had even been planned.
"You can’t postpone something that hasn’t been agreed upon. What some Western sources wrote yesterday, we did not confirm. We had no understanding at all regarding the timing or location of such a contact," he was quoted as saying by RIA Novosti news agency.
The idea for a Trump-Putin summit in Budapest emerged during a call between the two leaders on October 17.
SEE ALSO: Europe Jumps Into Action After Trump Call With Putin, Zelenskyy MeetingIt was expected that Rubio and Lavrov would meet to lay the groundwork ahead of the talks. The two men held a phone call on October 20.
Speaking the following day, Lavrov said the two men had agreed to continue telephone consultations "to better understand where we are and how to move in the right direction." He said Russia's war aims remained unchanged and that its "special military operation" would achieve its objectives.
Lavrov also repeated Russia’s opposition to an immediate cease-fire, saying it is necessary to find a solution that eliminates what the Kremlin calls the war’s “root causes.”
Trump had said on October 17 that Russian and Ukrainian forces should “stop where they are” on the battlefield.
Earlier, the State Department said in a statement that Rubio had “emphasized the importance of upcoming engagements as an opportunity for Moscow and Washington to collaborate on advancing a durable resolution of the Russia-Ukraine war, in line with President Trump’s vision."
Trump said on October 20 that attempts to reach an agreement between Russia and Ukraine to end the war are ongoing and warned that if an agreement is not reached, the consequences will be serious.
"We are still in a process of making a deal [to stop the war]. If we do, it will be fantastic. If not, a lot of people will pay a very heavy price," Trump said at a White House meeting with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
Zelenskyy 'Ready' For Budapest
Trump last week stepped up his efforts to broker a cease-fire, holding a phone call with Putin and meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the White House.
The talks with Zelenskyy appeared largely inconclusive.
Zelenskyy and senior European Union officials have repeatedly expressed doubts about Putin's willingness to end the war, and released a joint statement on October 21 underlining this.
"Russia's stalling tactics have shown time and time again that Ukraine is the only party serious about peace," said the statement, signed by Zelenskyy, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, EU chief Ursula von der Leyen, and others.
"We can all see that Putin continues to choose violence and destruction," they added.
Nevertheless, Zelenskyy has said that he's "ready" to sit down for peace talks in the Hungarian capital even though the venue selection has been criticized by the European Union given there's an International Criminal Court arrest warrant outstanding against Putin.
The Ukrainian leader, however, later warned that the US administration’s decision not to green-light Tomahawk missiles for Ukraine had weakened diplomatic leverage.
“Russia almost automatically became less interested in diplomacy,” Zelenskyy said in his evening address on October 21, accusing Moscow of “once again doing everything it can to abandon diplomacy.”
French President Emmanuel Macron said on October 20 that Europe must also be at the table. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov responded the following day by saying that "No one's talking about this yet. No one has discussed these details yet."
Meanwhile, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said that if Putin tried to fly across Poland to Hungary, the Polish Air Force might force his plane to land.
“I cannot guarantee that an independent Polish court won't order the government to escort such an aircraft down to hand the suspect to the court in The Hague,” he told Radio Rodzina. Lavrov said this would be a "terrorist act."
Amid the controversy, Hungary appeared to be moving ahead with plans for the summit. Its foreign minister told a briefing in Budapest that he would travel to the US capital on October 21 but gave no details of the trip. Diplomatic sources told RFE/RL that NATO chief Mark Rutte was likely headed to Washington on October 22.
Zelenskyy said on social media that there will be "many meeting and negotiations in Europe this week" amid media reports that he will fly to London on October 24 where a meeting of the so-called Coalition of the Willing, comprising over 20 Western allies of Ukraine, is to gather.