'Ridiculous war' — Trump hints at talks with Zelenskyy next week

US President Donald Trump has said he would probably meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy next week to discuss Ukraine-Russia war.

Trump did not make clear on Friday whether it would be a face-to-face meeting or a video conference. He spoke about the possibility while taking questions from reporters in an Oval Office welcome for Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba.

Trump said he will "probably be meeting with President Zelenskiy next week," and he also again expressed interest in meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin with whom he said he always had a "good relationship."

Asked for a location for such a meeting with Zelenskyy, Trump noted "I'm here" in Washington and said he would not be going to Ukraine.

"I'd like to see it end, just on a human basis," Trump said of Russia's three-year-old war with Ukraine. "I'd like to see that end. It's a ridiculous war."

Trump said he wanted to talk to Zelenskyy about security for Ukraine assets such as rare earth minerals and wants "an equal amount of something" in exchange for US support. "We would like them to equalise."

"We always appreciate working with President Trump. We're also planning meetings and talks at the teams' level. Right now Ukrainian and American teams are working out the details," Zelenskyy said in a post on X, without confirming whether a meeting with Trump would take place.

Kiev expects to host Trump's envoy

Ukraine, wanting continued US support in its war with Russia, is looking forward to a visit this month by Trump's special envoy for the region, Keith Kellogg, according to Zelenskyy's chief of staff Andy Yermak.

Yermak said he had spoken to Kellogg about topics including the battlefield situation, the safety of Ukrainian civilians, and meetings at the annual Munich Security Conference later this month.

Russia launched what it calls a "special military operation" in Ukraine on February 24, 2022. The war that followed was met with global sanctions, and military aid for Ukraine.

By late 2022, Moscow annexed four provinces Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia. The war soon became a grinding stalemate, with only small territorial shifts.

An estimated one million Ukrainians and Russians have been killed or wounded in war since it began three years ago.