EVIAN-LES-BAINS (AFP) — The G7 group of leading powers will hold talks on Tuesday with President Volodymyr Zelensky on Ukraine with US leader Donald Trump saying that “maybe we can do something” after over four years of war sparked by Russia’s full-scale invasion.
Zelensky will attend a special morning session of the summit in the French spa town of Evian devoted to Ukraine, which will be followed later in the day by a session on Iran to be attended by Arab leaders.
European leaders hosted by President Emmanuel Macron will be keen to remind Trump of the importance of pushing Russia to accept peace on Kyiv’s terms and not pressure Ukraine to accept concessions to Moscow.
Zelensky on Monday urged a “decisive and substantive” response from the G7 leaders after the latest wave of Russian strikes that killed at least 11 people and sparked a fire at a landmark Kyiv cathedral.
He revealed he had proposed a meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin at the G7, but that Moscow was “not ready” for it.
But Trump, who spoke by phone to both Zelensky and Putin, expressed optimism as he arrived at the summit Monday and said that “maybe we can do something” on Ukraine at the G7.
“They’re both open to it,” he said. “I had two very good conversations yesterday,” the US president added, without giving further details.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said ahead of the G7 summit session the UK is to supply enriched uranium to Ukraine for its nuclear power stations and impose new sanctions against Russia.
Denouncing Russia’s “barbaric strikes” on Ukraine, the UK is “stepping up” by “choking off the revenues that fuel Putin’s war and powering Ukraine through the winters ahead,” his office quoted Starmer as saying.