I Will Pick Up The Phone If Zelensky Calls - Putin

<blockquote><b>Vladimir Putin would answer the phone if Volodymyr Zelensky called, the Kremlin has said.<br><br>“I think he would ‌answer, of course. ⁠Putin has never ⁠refused talks,” Yuri ‌Ushakov, a Kremlin aide, claimed on Sunday.</b><br><br>His comments come before a resumption of US-brokered peace talks due to take place in Abu Dhabi this month.<br><br><b>The two leaders have not held direct talks in person or via phone call since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.<br><br>They last met in person in December 2019, during the Normandy Format talks mediated by France and Germany.</b><br><br>Kyiv, which has long pushed for a direct meeting between Mr Zelensky and Putin, has made several attempts to arrange a meeting since then.<br><br>In July, the Ukrainian president wrote an open letter to Putin calling for a face-to-face meeting to end the war in Ukraine.<br><br>The Kremlin was seeking to avoid a face-to-face meeting between the two leaders by proposing a phone call, the Kyiv Independent reported on Friday.<br>Ukrainian officials suspect Moscow is trying to arrange a phone call that would achieve little instead of a face-to-face meeting. “They’ve already tried to do this over the phone,” one senior Ukrainian official said.<br><br>Dmitry Peskov, a Kremlin spokesman, said on Oct 30 that Putin was “open to dialogue with everyone”.<br><br>Asked whether the Russian leader would speak with his Ukrainian counterpart by phone, Mr Peskov added that “no one has called yet”.<br>Putin has previously ruled out direct talks, calling Mr Zelensky an “illegitimate leader” and claiming he would only meet to finalise a deal approved beforehand.<br><br>Mr Peskov added that an initial round of peace talks should be in trilateral format with Russia, the US and Ukraine.<br><br>Asked whether Russia believed any European countries ‌should be involved in negotiations, he ‌said: “We have working contacts ⁠with the Americans. Therefore, ⁠it is logical, of course, that at least the first ‌rounds of negotiations should be held ⁠in a ⁠trilateral format.”<br><br>Russia would attempt to use the Abu Dhabi three-way talks this month to secure concessions that weaken Nato’s defences, diplomatic sources previously told The Telegraph.<br>Yuri Ushakov, a Kremlin foreign policy aide, said Europe should be included in the negotiations between Russian, Ukrainian and American officials because the Continent would be crucial to reaching an agreement.<br>But diplomatic sources told The Telegraph that Russia’s motive for including European nations was to use the next round of talks to win concessions over Nato expansion, which Putin had called the “root cause” of the war.<br><br>The Pentagon has reportedly urged Nato countries to tone down their warnings about the threat posed by Russia.<br><br>Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia are among the countries that have been told to soften their rhetoric against Russia to avoid “poking” Moscow.<br>Nato leaders were told that public statements condemning Russia risk undermining security, people familiar with the matter told Reuters.<br><br>Elbridge Colby, the Pentagon’s policy chief, was among US officials conveying the message in bilateral meetings. It was not clear whether other European governments received similar messages.<br><br>Mr Colby reportedly cited comments by European leaders suggesting the Russian leader was “cornered like a rat” as an example of unhelpful rhetoric.<br><br>Kristen Michal, Estonia’s prime minister, used the phrase in September to describe Putin’s increasingly desperate response to setbacks in Ukraine.<br><br>In a separate meeting, Pentagon officials urged an Estonian delegation to be “measured” in its public communications.<br><br>“We are helping you. The Americans are there. Just don’t be loud. Don’t make noise,” one European official reportedly said.<br><br>The Pentagon declined to comment on the allegations, saying: “Private conversations among allies are just that, so we will not comment.”</blockquote><a rel=ugc href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/11/01/putin-i-will-pick-up-the-phone-if-zelensky-calls/">https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/11/01/putin-i-will-pick-up-the-phone-if-zelensky-calls/</a>