Zelenskyy seeks new Trump meeting as peace negotiators tackle land issue

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Wednesday he would seek a new meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump as their officials revisited two long-standing sticking points in talks aimed at ending the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

Kyiv is under U.S. pressure to secure peace but wants security guarantees from allies and is pushing back on Russian demands to cede the eastern Donetsk region and give up control of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.

Speaking to reporters over WhatsApp on Wednesday, Zelenskyy said he wanted another meeting with Trump soon to gauge his openness to a Ukrainian proposal that Washington ensure security for Kyiv for more than 15 years in the event of a ceasefire.

He also urged Trump to step up pressure on Russia. "They have the tools, and they know how to use them," Zelenskyy said.

The White House did not immediately comment on the suggestion of a new meeting between Zelenskyy and Trump.

Citing the recent U.S. operation to forcibly seize Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Zelenskyy suggested Washington could similarly move against Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, a Vladimir Putin ally.

"Maybe then Putin would see it and think twice," he said.

Talks in Paris this week produced commitments from Kyiv's allies to back up a ceasefire with guarantees such as a multinational troop presence.

But Zelenskyy said the expression of "political will" had yet to be translated into legally binding pledges backed by national parliaments.

Zelenskyy spoke as U.S. and Ukrainian officials in Paris discussed the matter of territory and the fate of the Zaporizhzhia plant, Europe's largest nuclear facility, which he described as the two thorniest issues in the talks.

Kyiv has refused to pull out of the industrialized Donetsk region, which Russia has failed to seize entirely despite occupying wide swathes of it. Zelenskyy has said the U.S. has floated the idea of a free economic zone there if Ukraine withdraws from the parts of the region that it still controls.

On Tuesday, U.S. and Ukrainian officials had already talked through "some ideas" to address the issue of territory, he said. White House special envoy Steve Witkoff said "land options" had been discussed and that he hoped for compromise to be reached.

(With input from Reuters)