MOSCOW — Before the NATO summit opens in Ankara on Monday, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin spoke by phone on Saturday, and the Kremlin moved quickly to place Ukraine at the center of what was discussed.
Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov told reporters after the call that the two presidents had “naturally touched on the issue of a Ukrainian settlement, including in light of Donald Trump’s upcoming participation in the NATO summit in Turkey on July 7–8.” The phrasing was Moscow’s own, and it carries weight: the Kremlin framed the Ukraine conversation not as a bilateral negotiating session but as preparation for a meeting where Russia will have no seat at the table.
The Ankara summit convenes Monday. Alliance members are expected to address defense spending, Ukraine’s security relationship with NATO, and the alliance’s collective posture toward Russia. Trump’s pre-summit call with Putin introduces a layer of ambiguity about how Washington will position itself on all three. Some alliance partners, particularly those on NATO’s eastern flank, have expressed concern that the bilateral diplomatic track between Washington and Moscow runs outside any NATO framework and shapes US positions before the alliance has had a chance to coordinate.
Ushakov did not describe what Trump told Putin about his Ankara plans, and neither side released a shared readout. The Kremlin confirmed the topic was raised; it did not confirm any movement on ceasefire terms, territorial lines, or security guarantees for Ukraine. The Kremlin has made clear what it considers necessary for any substantive engagement to occur, and the conditions have not changed.
Ukraine was not party to Saturday’s call and had not commented publicly on it by Saturday evening. Kyiv’s position is that any settlement must involve direct Ukrainian participation, and any signal sent to Moscow before the Ankara summit will be read in Kyiv as an indication of whose framework Washington is inclined to work within. What Trump says in the alliance meeting room, and whether it tracks what he discussed with Putin, is the question the summit will answer.
Saturday’s call was the fourteenth between the two leaders since Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, and the fourth this year. The pace of engagement signals an active channel on Ukraine even as the military situation on the ground continues to move, with Russian forces expanding the security zone along the Ukrainian border and consolidating freshly captured territory in Donetsk. What the Ankara summit produces, and whether it influences the next phase of the Putin-Trump track, is not known.
