Washington, Dec 17
Donald Trump said on Monday that he would speak to the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and that of Russia Vladimir Putin to end the "carnage" of nearly three years of war, as the Kremlin leader lauded Russian army successes on the ground.
Both sides have rushed to gain an advantage on the battlefield ahead of Trump entering the White House in January, and there has been some alarm in Ukraine that it will be forced to make territorial concessions in exchange for peace.
Trump has been highly critical of billions of dollars of aid that Joe Biden's administration provided to Kyiv to battle Moscow's invasion.
He spoke on Monday at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida as Putin hailed his army's accelerating advance in Ukraine in what he called a "landmark" year.
"We'll be talking to President Putin, and we'll be talking to the representatives, Zelensky and representatives from Ukraine," Trump said.
"We gotta stop it, it's carnage," he added, referring to the war.
Trump has repeatedly claimed he could swiftly end the conflict but has not provided concrete details on how.