The idea of holding a meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in Budapest before the end of October quickly ran into obstacles. On October 21, 2025, Reuters, AFP, Axios and NBC, citing White House sources, reported that the summit might not take place soon or had been put on hold.
The doubts stemmed from differences over the basic framework for ending the war. After meeting Volodymyr Zelensky on October 17, Trump said the sides should simply stop fighting where they are. But on October 21, Sergey Lavrov replied that “simply stopping” would, in Moscow’s view, mean ignoring the “root causes of the conflict.”
“I do not want to hold a pointless meeting. I do not want to waste time,” Trump said, adding that a decision on next steps would be announced within the next two days.
At the same time, the Russian side says preparations are continuing. That was the position voiced by RDIF head Kirill Dmitriev, while Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto called reports of a delay fake. But according to The Telegraph and Reuters, Moscow again made clear in contacts with Washington that it would not accept a freeze of the front line and still insists, among other things, on control over the whole Donbas.
Against that backdrop, European leaders stress that any settlement cannot be shaped as a bilateral US-Russia deal without Kyiv. Bloomberg reported that the EU and Ukraine are discussing a phased plan involving a ceasefire, a prisoner exchange, the return of deported children, security guarantees for Ukraine and gradual sanctions relief for Russia if conditions are met.
Yet, as the article notes, the central question remains unanswered: how to secure Moscow’s agreement to the very first step, namely a ceasefire. Analysts at CSIS argue that the Kremlin currently has little interest in a real diplomatic compromise, and that a prolonged conflict or a low-intensity war remains the more likely outcome.