By Guy Faulconbridge, Gnaneshwar Rajan and Lidia Kelly
(Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump’s hopes for a quick summit in Budapest with Russian President Vladimir Putin may be stalled after a preparatory session between the leaders’ top foreign-policy aides this week was put on hold, CNN said on Monday.
Trump has repeatedly said he wants peace in Ukraine though he has also said finding it has been harder that reaching a ceasefire in Gaza or ending a brief conflict between India and Pakistan.
After speaking to Putin last week, Trump said U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov would meet.
CNN cited an unidentified White House official as saying the anticipated meeting had been put on hold for the time being, however. It cited one source as saying Rubio and Lavrov had divergent expectations about a possible end to the war.
The broadcaster said it was not clear what impact the delay to the Rubio-Lavrov meeting would have on the Trump-Putin summit planned for Budapest, a location with deep historical significance for both Kyiv and Moscow.
Rubio and Lavrov held a telephone call on Monday to discuss the next steps, according to Moscow and Washington.
Russia’s foreign ministry said there was “a constructive discussion”.
But Tommy Pigott, deputy spokesperson of the State Department, did not use the word constructive.
“The secretary 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,” Pigott said.
The White House and the Kremlin did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the CNN report. CNN said Rubio and Lavrov might speak by phone again this week.
The anticipated meeting between Rubio and Lavrov was considered to be the key preparatory step for the second summit this year between Trump and Putin.
The leaders agreed in a telephone call last Thursday to meet soon in the Hungarian capital of Budapest.
Putin, who ordered Russian troops into Ukraine in February 2022 after eight years of fighting in the country’s east between Russian-backed separatists and Ukrainian troops, has repeatedly said he is ready to talk about peace, and set out conditions for ending the war.
Trump and Putin met on August 15 at a Cold War-era air force base in the Alaskan city of Anchorage, in a bid to end the war, though some U.S. and Russian sources said there were significant disagreements about how to end the war.
Trump has said he thinks peace can be achieved, though he has variously warned President Volodymyr Zelenskiy that he has no cards and cast Russia as a “paper tiger” which failed to subdue Ukraine despite its vast armed forces.
(Reporting by Gnaneshwar Rajan and Devika Nair in Bengaluru and Lidia Kelly in Melbourne; Writing by Guy Faulconbridge in Moscow; Editing by Kate Mayberry and Clarence Fernandez)
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