US President Donald Trump has reportedly appealed directly to Chinese leader Xi Jinping to use Beijing’s influence over Russian leader Vladimir Putin to help break the deadlock in efforts to end Russia’s war against Ukraine.
Citing sources familiar with discussions during last month’s summit in Beijing, the South China Morning Post reported that Trump told Xi that negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv had effectively stalled and urged China to push Russia back to the negotiating table.
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While Beijing continues to present itself as neutral, it has avoided describing Russia as the aggressor and Ukraine as the victim, and has remained largely outside international efforts aimed at ending the war.
The direct peace talks between Kyiv and Moscow have remained frozen since negotiations in Turkey collapsed in July 2025 without producing a ceasefire agreement. In the months that followed, the negotiations continued in a trilateral format with US mediation.
The first round of Ukraine-US-Russia talks took place on Jan. 24 in Abu Dhabi, followed by a second round in February and further discussions in Geneva. However, these negotiations later also stalled amid the escalation of the US-Iran conflict and persistent disagreements over the Donetsk region.
Last week, on May 22, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington is still prepared to play a mediating role in efforts to end the war in Ukraine, but acknowledged that current peace talks have produced no results.
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“The peace negotiations on Ukraine under American leadership… we got involved, because we were told we were the only ones that could do it. We were the only ones that the Russians and the Ukrainians would talk to,” Rubio said.
Trump’s reported appeal to Xi comes as battlefield dynamics continue to shift. Ukraine has regained more territory than it has lost in recent months.
In an interview with CBS News, aired on Sunday, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia has been losing battlefield initiatives since late 2025 and argues that Ukraine is now entering a limited “window” for diplomacy before winter, as Moscow’s military gains stall and losses mount.
At the same time, Moscow has escalated its aerial campaign against Ukraine. Russia’s foreign ministry claimed at the end of May that its forces were beginning “systematic” strikes on Ukraine’s military-industrial facilities in Kyiv and so-called “decision-making centers,” while urging foreign nationals and diplomatic staff to leave the capital.
On Tuesday, June 2, a major Russian barrage killed at least 12 and wounded over 100 after dozens of missiles and over 600 drones were launched across Ukraine.
