European nations 'going to take a lot of burden' on deterring aggression against Ukraine, Trump says

Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump have started their talks with European leaders at the White House.

They have met Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, France’s Emmanuel Macron, Italy’s Giorgia Meloni, Germany’s Friedrich Merz, Finland’s Alexander Stubb, as well as NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, for a multilateral talk.

Mr Trump said Vladimir Putin “agreed that Russia would accept security guarantees for Ukraine”. He added: “I think that the European nations are going to take a lot of the burden. We’re going to help them, and we’re going to make it very secure.”

Follow the latest: Trump vows to stop war

The US president said one point on the agenda for the leaders to discuss in Washington tonight was “who would do what”.

The mention of US involvement in security guarantees was welcomed by the European leaders, with Ms Von der Leyen saying it was “good to hear” the nations were working on “Article Five-like security guarantees”.

NATO’s Article Five is the principle that an attack on one member is considered an attack on all of them.

“When we speak about security guarantees, we speak about the whole security of the European continent,” French President Emmanuel Macron said.

He added that one guarantee he would want to come out of any deals is that Ukraine should be able to have a “credible” army for “the years and decades to come”.

Mr Zelensky and Mr Trump previously met in the Oval Office, where Mr Trump already said that there would be some form of security guarantees for Ukraine, which would include the US being involved in providing them.

But the US president did not say whether any security guarantees would involve US troops. He later added that the US will provide “very good protection” for Ukraine.

Sky News understands that European leaders and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will stay in Washington for now to continue talks.

Trilateral meeting possible

The US president said that “if everything works out well today”, there will be a trilateral meeting between himself, Mr Putin and Mr Zelenskyy. The latter said he was ready for such a meeting.

At the end of the news conference in the Oval Office, Mr Trump said he would have a call with Mr Putin “right after” the White House meetings.

The talks with Mr Zelenskyy and European leaders come just days after Mr Trump’s Alaska summit with Mr Putin.

At the summit, Mr Putin has reportedly made demands to take control of the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Ukraine as a condition for ending the war.

In exchange, Russia would give up other Ukrainian territories held by its troops, according to several news reports citing sources close to the matter.

Russian troops currently occupy large parts of the two regions and, in September 2022, Moscow announced it was officially annexing them, alongside the Kherson and Zaporizhia regions, in a move rejected and condemned as illegal by the West.

Mr Trump is said to be planning to urge Mr Zelenskyy to agree to the conditions as part of a peace deal to end the war – despite the Ukrainian president previously ruling out handing any territory to Moscow.

“We also need to discuss the possible exchanges of territory,” the US president said ahead of the multilateral talks with Mr Zelenskyy and European leaders.

He said such exchanges would need to take “into consideration the current line of contact”.

He added: “That means the war zone, the war lines that are now, pretty obvious, very sad, actually, to look at them and negotiating positions.”

Infamous Oval Office clash

Mr Zelenskyy and Mr Trump shook hands upon the Ukrainian president’s arrival at the White House.

The greeting was friendly, with Mr Trump putting his arm around Mr Zelenskyy’s shoulder for a brief moment as both smiled.

Later in the Oval Office, both leaders were all smiles – a clear contrast to Mr Zelenskyy’s previous White House visit, which descended into chaos when vice-president JD Vance berated Ukraine’s leader for being insufficiently grateful for US help – in front of the media.

He completed his ambush of Mr Zelenskyy by mocking him for not wearing a suit, with Mr Trump adding that the Ukrainian did not “have the cards right now with us”.

The disastrous meeting ended with Mr Zelenskyy prematurely leaving the White House. He later said the bust-up was “not good for both sides”.

This time, Mr Zelenskyy appeared to set the tone by arriving at the White House dressed in a smart black collared shirt and black jacket with lapels.

Sky News’ US correspondent Mark Stone said he believes this “will be seen as a really important moment. We have learnt with Donald Trump that the trivial matters as much as the detail”.

Zelenskyy learned from previous Oval Office meeting

Zelenskyy’s learned from that moment six months ago and he’s learned from what other European leaders and other world leaders have learned as well with these Oval Office moments – that the best policy is to say as little as possible.

Don’t answer the question. Don’t rise to the bait. Get in there and out as soon and as quickly as you can.

And this time, that is precisely what Zelenskyy did.

You can see that Donald Trump’s key advisers, key officials were there, JD Vance among them.

But this time, he said nothing – an altogether different feel to the moment.

A pivot point

Sky News’ deputy political editor Sam Coates said that there would have been an “almighty sigh of relief” among the European leaders who watched the Oval Office news conference.

“I actually think what we have just witnessed was a pivot point, potentially, in this war. Not only did you have Volodymyr Zelenskyy turning up with a different tone and a different approach […] but there was important substance in the room,” he said.

He added that the language around security would be why “this will be remembered as a significant day”.