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President says ceasefire reached in Ukraine talks and that about 1,000 prisoners will be exchanged
Summary
In a press briefing the president said he had secured a temporary ceasefire in the Russia–Ukraine war, that Presidents Putin and Zelensky agreed, and that both sides would transfer roughly 1,000 prisoners each; he said he might pursue further negotiations in Moscow.
The president said at a news briefing that he had brokered a temporary ceasefire in the Russia–Ukraine war and that President Vladimir Putin and President Volodymyr Zelensky "readily" agreed to it, including an exchange of roughly "a thousand on each side a thousand prisoners back."
The announcement came in response to questions about the three-day pause in fighting. "It could be. I mean, it could be. It would be nice. I'd like to see it stop," the president said when asked whether the three-day ceasefire could be extended, adding later that "we have a ceasefire and I think everyone's happy."
Why it matters: the president framed the pause as a humanitarian step and described the prisoner exchange as a concrete outcome of talks he said he helped facilitate. He characterized the fighting in Ukraine as "the worst thing since World War II in terms of life," a point he used to explain his interest in extending the pause and continuing negotiations.
On follow-up talks, the president said he "would do it" — referring to sending a team to Moscow — "if I thought it would help," and that he would "love to see" the war end. He also said he had previously helped settle other conflicts and expressed a desire to expand the pause if possible: "I'd like to see a big extension."
Claims and figures: the president repeated casualty figures for the war and described an exchange of "a thousand on each side" as immediate; he also called the transfer "very good." The briefing did not include an independent verification of either the casualty numbers or the prisoner-exchange timeline.
What’s next: the president said he may send a team to Moscow to try to extend the pause but gave no timetable and did not describe specific U.S. roles for monitoring or verifying the exchange. Reporters asked whether the ceasefire should include related regional areas like Iraq and Iraqi Kurdistan; the president said his aim was to "get the whole thing ended, not just individual movements."
