Putin open to talks with Trump, waiting for 'signals'

A day after US President Donald Trump expressed his desire to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin as soon as possible, the Kremlin announced on Friday that Putin is ready to hold a phone call with Trump, News.az reports citing France24.

"Putin is ready. We are waiting for signals [from Washington]. Everyone is ready. It is difficult to read the coffee grounds here. As soon as there is something, if there is something, we will inform you," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Moscow on Friday.

Trump on Thursday said he wanted to meet Putin to secure an end to the war with Ukraine and expressed his desire to work towards cutting nuclear arms, something the Kremlin said Putin had made clear he wanted, too. He also added that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wanted to negotiate.

Kremlin urges Trump to resume nuclear disarmament talks

Peskov also said Russia wanted to resume nuclear disarmament talks with the US, responding to Trump's statement on Thursday that he wanted the world to "denuclearise".

Negotiations between the world's two largest nuclear powers have been left at an impasse amid tensions over the Ukraine conflict.

Moscow pulled out of the last remaining arms control agreement with Washington, called "New START", in 2023 amid a sharp deterioration in relations between the two countries.

Both have indicated they will unilaterally adhere to the warhead limits outlined in the treaty until 2026 but they are yet to agree on a replacement and talks have stalled for months.

"We are interested in starting this negotiation process as soon as possible," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Friday.

"The ball is in the Americans' court, who have stopped all substantive contacts," he added.

Russia dismisses Trump's linkage of oil prices with Ukraine war

The Ukraine conflict has plunged relations between the two nuclear powers to their lowest levels since the Cold War, with Trump repeatedly promising to end the fighting with a "deal".

Trump has threatened Russia with tougher economic sanctions if it does not agree to end its nearly three-year offensive.

"If they don't settle this war soon, like almost immediately, I'm going to put massive tariffs on Russia, and massive taxes, and also big sanctions," the Republican said during a Fox News interview on Thursday.

The Kremlin rejected Trump's claim that the conflict in Ukraine could be ended by lowering the price of oil used to fund Moscow's budget, saying: "This conflict does not depend on oil prices."

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Thursday, Trump had said that he would ask Saudi Arabia and OPEC+ to lower oil prices, saying: "If the price came down, the Russia-Ukraine war would end immediately."

Peskov said the conflict was instead based on "threats to Russia's national security", "threats to Russians" living in Ukraine and "the lack of desire and complete refusal of Americans and Europeans to listen to Russia's concerns".

News.Az