Putin tells Trump a Ukraine ceasefire is 'possible if the right agreements are reached'

In a phone call with the US president Vladimir Putin said that Russia was ready to work on a memorandum with Ukraine, which includes a possible ceasefire for a fixed period of time.

In a phone call with US President Donald Trump, Russia's leader Vladimir Putin said "a ceasefire is possible if the right agreements are reached."Putin also said that Russia is ready to work on a memorandum with Ukraine, which includes a potential ceasefire for a fixed period of time.Putin also said that contacts between the negotiating groups that met in Istanbul for talks last week had "resumed."The Russian leader said the Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov or the head of Moscow's negotiating team, Vladimir Ushakov, would give more details later.Russia's state-owned news agency, TASS, reported that the call between Trump and Putin had lasted for approximately two and a half hours.Growing frustrationCommenting on the call earlier on Monday, the White House press secretary said Trump’s goal was "to see a ceasefire."Karoline Leavitt also admitted that the US president has "grown very frustrated with both sides" of the war."Nothing's going to happen until Putin and I together," the US president told reporters on 15 May, later adding "I think it's time for us to just do it."US Vice President JD Vance also said on Monday that Trump intended to press Putin about whether he is genuinely interested in ending the full-scale invasion of Ukraine."We realise there's a bit of an impasse here," Vance said, adding "And I think the president's going to say to President Putin: 'Look, are you serious? Are you real about this?'"He said that he was not sure Putin has a strategy for ending the war, but added that Washington might walk away from trying to mediate any deal if no meaningful progress towards peace was made.Although it was Putin himself who suggested directs talks between Russia and Ukraine, he didn’t accept an invitation by Volodymyr Zelenskyy to talks in Istanbul last week, instead sending a lower-level delegation.Ukraine's president met with his team earlier on Monday to "evaluate the outcome" of those talks, saying that Kyiv had done everything to bring a ceasefire closer and that Russia was the obstacle to peace."The meetings on May 15–16 demonstrated to the world our readiness to bring peace closer and, accordingly, the need to put pressure on Russia to end the war," Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram.He said that the most important outcome of the talks was an agreement to exchange 1,000 prisoners of war from each side. Preparations for that swap are underway by Ukraine’s Security Service.