WASHINGTON, August 7. /TASS/. Special US Envoy Steve Witkoff will today inform representatives of Ukraine and some of Washington's NATO allies about his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Axios reports.
According to its sources, Witkoff will hold remote consultations with officials from the UK, Germany, Italy, Ukraine, Finland and France "to brief them on his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin and discuss the path forward, including a possible Trump-Putin summit, according to two sources with direct knowledge."
The story says that Trump on Wednesday had a telephone conversation with the leaders of European states and with Vladimir Zelensky "and told them about the possibility of a meeting between him and Putin, and a trilateral summit afterwards including Zelensky." According to the portal, "that call left confusion in Kiev and other European capitals." The officials were uncertain "whether US policy was changing, or whether sanctions would still be announced on Friday as Trump had planned."
As noted in the story, Kiev fears that Russia and the United States may reach agreements on a settlement "without Ukraine or the European powers having a say."
Earlier, Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov said that Russia and the United States had agreed on a meeting between Putin and Trump in the coming days. According to him, the work on the summit has now begun.
On July 14, Trump imposed a 50-day deadline on Russia to reach a settlement agreement with Ukraine or face 100% trade duties against it and its trading partners.
On July 29, the American leader slashed the deadline to ten days, which expire on August 8.
On August 6, the United States imposed additional 25% import duties on India to punish it for the purchase of Russian oil and petroleum products.