Zelensky to meet with Trump in Washington next week, media reports

President Volodymyr Zelensky will meet U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington next week during a visit to the United States for the funeral of late U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham, Suspilne reported on July 24, citing diplomatic sources.

Graham's funeral is set to take place at the Washington National Cathedral on July 28. A staunch ally of both Ukraine and President Trump, Graham suddenly died July 11 after returning from a trip to Kyiv, after announcing he had reached an agreement with the White House on the long-delayed Russia sanctions bill.

The timing of the Trump-Zelensky meeting was not immediately clear. Suspilne previously reported that the Presidential Office was finalizing the details of the potential visit. The Presidential Office has not yet confirmed the meeting.

The planned visit to the United States comes amid a six-month freeze in peace negotiations among Kyiv, Moscow, and Washington.

Diplomatic efforts between Washington and Kyiv appeared to pick up on July 22 amid a visit from Trump's U.S. envoy to NATO, Matt Whitaker to Kyiv to discuss deliveries of Patriot missiles and the pending U.S.-Ukraine Drone Deal.

A separate phone conversation between Zelensky and Trump's special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner was also held later in the day on July 22.

The pace of talks intensified again on July 23 when U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Manila on the sidelines of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Foreign Ministers' meeting.

The two discussed U.S.-Russia relations and "the need to end the Russia-Ukraine war," Rubio said.

"If, when peace comes, it'll be because of some new idea and some new concepts, and we're prepared to offer some of those in the right setting and form if the opportunity presents itself and the conditions are right," Rubio said. "We're prepared to play that role in a positive way."

Zelensky's talks with members of the Trump team appear to signal a thaw in the U.S. government's attitude towards Ukraine.

Following months of uncertainty and stalled diplomacy, Trump said earlier this month for the first time that Washington would grant Ukraine licenses to produce their own Patriot interceptors. The announcement, delivered alongside Zelensky at the NATO summit in Turkey, marked a crucial win for Ukraine as it faces a shortage of effective defensive weapons against Russian ballistic missiles.

Additional progress benefiting Kyiv was also made earlier last week when a bipartisan group of U.S. senators unveiled a revised version of the bill championed by Graham that slaps sanctions on top buyers of Russian oil and gas, aiming to undercut the Kremlin's wartime revenues.

The bill, which has gathered the necessary support among U.S. lawmakers to overcome the Senate filibuster, would impose a tariff of up to 100% on the top five buyers of Russian energy, among other measures.