Russian President Vladimir Putin has proposed a summit with US President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping to negotiate an end to the four-year-old war in Ukraine — a summit that would discuss Ukraine's future without Ukraine's president at the table. The idea was floated during an October 9 phone call between Putin and Trump, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday 18 October, and the Kremlin confirmed on Monday 19 October that discussions are genuinely under way. Trump, for his part, said he would be open to such a meeting — but he reframed it as a summit about nuclear weapons, not about Ukraine. The story is trending per news coverage.
The proposal is the boldest diplomatic gambit yet in a month of fast-moving developments around the war, arriving days after Trump announced a deal to buy Russian diesel, waived key sanctions on Moscow, and publicly declared that he thinks "somebody else" should negotiate for Ukraine. It is also the mirror image of a competing proposal: Zelenskyy has separately said the US is working on a trilateral meeting that would include Ukraine, possibly at the G20 in Miami in December. Two trilateral summits are now on the table — and they could not be more different.
What Putin proposed
According to the Journal's reporting, which cites a former Russian intelligence officer briefed on the discussions, Putin raised the idea during his October 9 telephone call with Trump — the same call that produced the diesel deal between the two countries. The pitch: the three most powerful leaders in the world would meet next month to talk about Ukraine and negotiate an end to the war on terms favorable to Moscow.
The Kremlin has suggested holding the trilateral dialogue on the sidelines of the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, which is set for November 18 to 19 in Shenzhen, China. Russian officials have approached Beijing through diplomatic channels, and Chinese representatives have indicated they would not object to the meeting if Trump agrees, the Journal reported.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed to the Journal that discussions were taking place over a potential meeting, while stressing that nothing is settled. "There is no clear understanding yet regarding the meeting itself or its potential agenda, although all three parties acknowledge the hypothetical possibility of such a meeting taking place," he said. Peskov also acknowledged that Ukraine would have to participate in any final settlement — a concession that did little to calm Kyiv.
The proposal reportedly goes further than Ukraine. The former Russian intelligence officer told the Journal that Putin's ambition is for the three powers to establish spheres of influence around the world — in effect, a rerun of the 1945 Yalta summit, where US President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill divided postwar Europe between them. Yalta itself took place in Crimea — now occupied Ukrainian territory — which adds a sharp historical irony. Experts quoted in coverage called the idea of a new Yalta completely unrealistic, noting that it would imply Russian dominance over eastern European NATO allies like Poland and Finland and a Chinese challenge to American partners in the Pacific like Japan and South Korea.
Trump's response: yes to a summit, but about nukes
Asked about the proposal on Monday, Trump said he would attend a three-way meeting — "Anything I can do to end the war, whether somebody's there or not," he told reporters — but he swiftly redirected its purpose away from Ukraine and toward nuclear arms.
"I would do it, not so much for Ukraine," Trump said. "Russia, frankly, has been fine on Ukraine, they haven't been doing much — and the same thing with China. We would have it to talk about nuclear weapons and denuclearization." He called a denuclearization meeting between the leaders of the three countries "a very positive thing for the world" and said it would likely be held in China. "If President Xi wants to have it, I'd have it," he added, leaving room for other topics like trade.
That framing matters. Trump has pursued a three-way denuclearization agreement with Moscow and Beijing for years, and recasting the summit this way lets him say yes to the meeting without committing to negotiate Ukraine's future in a room where Kyiv is absent. A senior US official had earlier told the Journal that Trump had not agreed to the summit as proposed but could be receptive to the idea.
Trump is scheduled to visit China next month for the APEC leaders' meeting, which would be his second visit to China in his second term — the diary alignment that makes the Shenzhen sidelines the natural, if still unconfirmed, setting.
The diesel deal and the sanctions waiver: why now
The summit proposal did not arrive in a vacuum. The October 9 Putin-Trump call also yielded an agreement for the United States to purchase Russian diesel fuel and facilitate its sale on global markets, and on Friday Trump signed an order waiving key sanctions on Moscow — moves that have drawn bipartisan criticism in Washington and sharp objections from Kyiv.
Zelenskyy has warned that the sanctions relief would embolden Putin and prolong the war, and in an interview with Bloomberg he accused Trump of trying to force Ukraine's surrender more than four years after Russia invaded and annexed four Ukrainian regions. The feud between the two leaders has been escalating for weeks, with Trump accusing Zelenskyy of prolonging the war.
On Monday, Trump went further. He reupped his calls to replace Zelenskyy as Ukraine's chief negotiator, telling reporters: "To be honest, I think it's time for somebody else to negotiate on behalf of Ukraine." He added: "We've given a lot to Ukraine, they have given nothing to us, remember that." Coming from the man who would represent the United States at a three-power summit about Ukraine, the remark explains exactly why Kyiv is alarmed at the prospect of being left outside the room.
Kyiv's competing trilateral
Ukraine is not without its own summit plan. Just days earlier, Zelenskyy said the United States is working to set up a trilateral meeting that would bring together Ukraine, the US and Russia — possibly during the G20 summit in Miami on December 14-15, with the UAE, Saudi Arabia or a European country as alternatives. That proposal puts Zelenskyy at the table as an equal party.
The contrast between the two proposals captures the current state of play: Kyiv wants a negotiated settlement in which it participates; Moscow wants a great-power arrangement in which Ukraine's fate is decided by others. The Kremlin has floated its version since July, raising it in two separate phone calls with Trump, according to people familiar with the discussions — while China's government has not yet publicly expressed a willingness to host or participate in such a summit.
Meanwhile, Kushner and Witkoff headed to Norway for Ukraine peace talks, a separate diplomatic track that shows Washington is pursuing multiple channels at once. Whether any of them converge — or collide — will become clearer in the coming weeks.
What it means and what happens next
The stakes of the proposal are straightforward to state and hard to overstate. A summit of the US, Russia and China to settle the Ukraine war without Ukraine would upend the principle — held by Kyiv and its European backers — that nothing about Ukraine should be decided without Ukraine. It would also mark a historic diplomatic milestone: no three-way summit of the American, Russian and Chinese leaders has ever taken place, and holding one on Chinese soil would elevate Beijing's role as a power broker between Washington and Moscow.
For Europe, the proposal is a nightmare scenario: a deal struck over its head about a war on its continent, with implications for NATO's eastern flank and the sanctions regime Europe has maintained. European leaders have been building their own track for negotiations with Russia, and a separate European channel may become Kyiv's insurance policy if Washington's approach leans toward pressing Ukraine for concessions.
Watch for three signals in the coming days. First, any statement from Beijing — China's public posture on the proposal will determine whether the Shenzhen option is real or aspirational. Second, whether Moscow confirms anything beyond exploratory talks; silence so far about details is not a no, but it is not a yes either. Third, how the sanctions question evolves: on Friday, Trump halted implementation of sanctions that were to be imposed on Russia under a bipartisan bill he signed last month, drawing criticism from lawmakers including some of his allies. Whether the waived measures stay waived will tell observers how much pressure Washington is actually prepared to apply.
For now, the honest summary is this: Putin wants a Yalta-style three-power summit on Ukraine without Ukraine; Trump says he would meet Putin and Xi — to talk about nukes; and the war, now in its fifth year, goes on while the diplomacy multiplies. The next few weeks will show whether this is the beginning of a real negotiation or another trial balloon in an already crowded sky. Sources: The Wall Street Journal (18-19 October 2026); Reuters (19 October 2026); The New York Post (19 October 2026); Military.com (19 October 2026); Politico Europe (19 October 2026); Dimsum Daily (19 October 2026).