Putin and Trump held ‘businesslike’ 90-minute July 4 call, Moscow says

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin listens to the Governor of the Kursk Region Alexander Khinshtein during their meeting at the Kremlin in Moscow, on June 30, 2026.

Gavriil Grigorov/Sputnik/AP

Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke with Donald Trump on a July 4 call lasting nearly 90 minutes in which the US leader again offered to help end the Ukraine war, according to Russia’s foreign ministry.

The call came ahead of a critical NATO summit in Turkey starting Tuesday that the US president plans to attend and as Russian forces stepped up efforts to take more of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region - a key objective for the Kremlin.

Ukraine meanwhile has continued to target Russian energy infrastructure.

Putin personally congratulated Trump “and the entire American people on this significant holiday” — the 250th anniversary of the US declaration of independence — the foreign ministry said.

The conversation, their fourth this year, was “businesslike and highly constructive,” the ministry said, adding that Trump had “reaffirmed his readiness to facilitate the earliest possible cessation of hostilities” in the Ukrainian conflict.

CNN has reached out to the White House for comment on the conversation.

“The Russian side once again emphasized the preference for a political and diplomatic resolution to the conflict,” according to the foreign ministry, which claimed that “Kyiv and its European sponsors are banking on prolonging and even escalating the conflict.”

“Our president has outlined the reality of the situation on the battlefield, where the Russian Armed Forces are advancing confidently,” the ministry said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he had also had a “very good call” with Trump on Saturday.

“There is a real prospect to put an end to this war, and America’s resolve is decisive,” Zelensky said.

The conflict will form the backdrop to the upcoming NATO summit after the US announced last month that it would “rightsize its contributions to the NATO force model,” citing a need for the alliance to not over rely on US forces.

Russia’s Donetsk claims

The Kremlin has long insisted that the conflict will only end when Russia has taken all of the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. This weekend it claimed to have taken control of the town of Kostyantynivka in Donetsk, which the foreign ministry called an “important milestone.”