US President Donald Trump said Wednesday he believes Vladimir Putin wants to end the Ukraine war, despite talks between the Russian president and American negotiators ending without a deal.Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner negotiated into the early hours with Putin in the Kremlin but reached no breakthrough for a settlement to end Europe’s worst conflict since World War II.The Kremlin said Wednesday that its army’s recent battlefield successes in Ukraine had bolstered its position, adding that the two sides failed to find a “compromise” and that Kyiv’s ties to NATO remained a key question.”I thought they had a very good meeting yesterday with President Putin,” Trump said when an AFP reporter asked him in the Oval Office how the negotiations had gone.”What comes out of that meeting? I can’t tell you, because it does take two to tango.”Pressed on whether Witkoff and Kushner got any sense that Putin genuinely wanted to halt Russia’s nearly four-year-old invasion, Trump replied: “He would like to end the war. That was their impression.””Their impression was very strongly that he’d like to make a deal,” he added.Witkoff and Kushner brought an updated version of a US plan to end the war, which included Ukraine ceding parts of the eastern Donbas region and agreeing not to join NATO.- ‘Successes of the Russian army’ -But while the White House had voiced optimism ahead of the Kremlin talks, Moscow said afterward it had found parts of the plan unacceptable.Russia’s advance in eastern Ukraine gathered pace last month and Putin has said in recent days that Moscow is ready to fight on to seize the rest of the land it claims if Kyiv does not surrender it.”The progress and nature of the negotiations were influenced by the successes of the Russian army on the battlefield in recent weeks,” Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov, who took part in the US-Russia talks, told reporters, including AFP.Moscow insisted it was incorrect to say Putin rejected the plan in its entirety.It also said Russia was still committed to diplomacy, despite Putin’s stark warning that Moscow was prepared to fight Europe if it wanted war.”We are still ready to meet as many times as is needed to reach a peace settlement,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. Trump said Ukraine was “pretty well” on board with a US-backed proposal to end the conflict, but said Kyiv should have agreed to a deal when he had an angry encounter with President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office back in February.”When I was in his office and I talked about no cards, I said, ‘you have no cards,’ that was the time to settle,” he added.- ‘Opportunity to end the war’ -The fresh talks come as NATO pledges to buy hundreds of millions of dollars worth of US arms for Kyiv. NATO chief Mark Rutte said it was positive that peace talks were ongoing, but that the alliance should make sure that “Ukraine is in the strongest possible position to keep the fight going”.Zelensky said that though a window of opportunity for peace has opened, it must be accompanied by pressure on Moscow. “The world now clearly feels that there is an opportunity to end the war, and the current activity in negotiations must be supported by pressure on Russia,” he said in a regular evening address. Russian troops have been grinding forward across the front line against outgunned and outnumbered Ukrainian forces.Earlier this week, Moscow claimed to have captured the important stronghold of Pokrovsk, but a Ukrainian army unit fighting in the city said urban combat was still ongoing.European countries have expressed fears Washington and Moscow will reach agreements without them and have spent the last weeks trying to amend the US plan so that it does not force Kyiv to capitulate. burs-dk/md

President Donald Trump announced Wednesday a reset of Joe Biden’s fuel-economy standards, arguing it will lower US car prices — but critics warned it would worsen climate change and leave drivers paying more at the pump.Trump was flanked in the Oval Office by the CEOs of Ford and Stellantis and a senior General Motors official, a show of buy-in from Detroit’s “Big Three.””My administration is taking historic action to lower costs for American consumers, protect American auto jobs and make buying a car much more affordable,” the US president said.”Today is a victory (for) common sense and affordability,” Ford CEO Jim Farley chipped in.Environmentalists quickly pushed back, saying the windback stood out even among Trump’s many anti-green actions because of its outsized impact on car-dependent America.”Trump is taking a wrecking ball to the biggest single step any nation has ever taken to combat oil use, global warming pollution, and helping save consumers money at the gas pump,” Dan Becker, an activist with the Center for Biological Diversity, told AFP. At stake are the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards, created in 1975 in response to the Arab oil embargo, which require vehicles to achieve the “maximum feasible” mileage per gallon. Under the proposed rule, the administration would roll back past and planned efficiency increases, targeting a fleetwide average of 34.5 miles per gallon by model year 2031 — “no better than what American cars are getting today,” said Becker, noting CAFE figures overstate real-world mileage by roughly 25 percent.Trump’s Department of Transport argues that Biden officials improperly factored in electric and hybrid vehicles, saying the standards would be unattainable for gasoline-powered cars and would effectively force a shift in the market.Gina McCarthy, a former senior official under Biden and Barack Obama, countered the move would not only worsen climate change but harm the auto industry by slowing its shift to electric vehicles.”The rest of the world will continue to innovate and create cleaner cars that people want to buy and drive, while we’re forced to sit in our clunkers, paying more for gas, and pumping out more tailpipe emissions.”- Trump EV fight -Trump has railed against what he calls an EV “mandate” — a stance that puts him at odds with his on-again, off-again billionaire ally Elon Musk, the Tesla CEO whose company still dominates the US EV market.Republicans in Congress have repealed clean-energy tax credits in a major tax and spending bill, and targeted California’s ability to set its own vehicle-emission limits.Throughout 2025, GM and other US automakers have curtailed or pushed back new EV plant capacity.But whether savings from reduced EV investment will filter through to consumers remains unclear.While the shift away from EVs does allow automakers to delay or forego billions of dollars in new investments, some funds are being steered into new initiatives to add US carbuilding capacity in light of Trump’s tariffs.”Meeting high fuel economy standards has been challenging for the auto industry and has added to vehicle cost,” Charlie Chesbrough, an analyst with Cox Automotive, told AFP.”However, consumers like fuel-efficient vehicles. This year traditional hybrids are up double digits from last year while gas vehicles are basically flat,” he added.”Since most consumers don’t have transportation alternatives available, people fear high gas prices. And good MPG is a way to mitigate that risk.”

Former Special Counsel Jack Smith was summoned on Wednesday to appear before a Republican-led House committee looking into his prosecution of US President Donald Trump.Representative Jim Jordan, the Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, issued a subpoena to Smith ordering him to testify on December 17.Smith had requested that his testimony be delivered in public, but the committee has opted instead to have him deposed behind closed doors.Trump was accused by Smith of mishandling classified documents after leaving the White House and plotting to overturn the results of the 2020 election he lost to Democrat Joe Biden.Neither case came to trial and Smith — in line with a Justice Department policy of not prosecuting a sitting president — dropped them both after Trump won the November 2024 presidential election.Trump, speaking to reporters at the White House on Wednesday, called Smith a “thug” and an “evil man” and said he would like to see him testify publicly.”I’d rather see him testify publicly, because there’s no way he can answer the questions,” he said.Since taking office for the second time, Trump has urged the Justice Department to bring cases against Smith and a number of other perceived political opponents.Cases brought against Trump foes James Comey, a former FBI director, and New York Attorney General Letitia James collapsed last month after a judge ruled that the prosecutor who brought the charges was unlawfully appointed.- ‘Full unvarnished truth’ -Representative Jamie Raskin, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, criticized the decision by the Republicans on the oversight panel not to allow Smith to testify publicly.”What are our colleagues so afraid of, that they won’t let the American people hear directly from the Special Counsel?” Raskin said in a statement.”The American people deserve to hear the full unvarnished truth about Special Counsel Smith’s years-long effort to investigate and prosecute the crimes committed by Donald Trump and his co-conspirators,” he said.”Judiciary Committee Republicans want to force the Special Counsel into the shadows of a backroom interrogation and subject him to the tiresome and loathsome partisan tactics of leak-and-distort, when the American public is demanding transparency and a public hearing,” Raskin added.Peter Koski, Smith’s lawyer, also expressed disappointment that his client would not be allowed to testify publicly.”Nearly six weeks ago Jack offered to voluntarily appear before the House Judiciary committee in an open hearing to answer any questions lawmakers have about his investigation into President Trump’s alleged efforts to unlawfully overturn the election results and retention of classified documents,” Koski said in a statement to US media.”We are disappointed that offer was rejected, and that the American people will be denied the opportunity to hear directly from Jack on these topics,” Koski added.