United States First Lady Melania Trump has urged Russia and Ukraine to build on a recent localised ceasefire and seek a more “enduring” peace, as she hosted officials from both countries at the White House.
Melania Trump spoke on Thursday at an event that the White House said is believed to be “the first time in American history that a First Lady has personally brought representatives of two nations at war to the White House for diplomacy”.
Those attending included Kirill Dmitriev, a special envoy of Russian President Vladimir Putin; Yana Lantratova, Russia’s human rights commissioner; David Arakhamia, leader of the Servant of the People party in Ukraine’s parliament; and Dmytro Lubinets, Ukraine’s parliamentary human rights commissioner.
“Together, we can create something more enduring than a temporary ceasefire,” Mrs. Trump said, urging both sides to see the humanitarian truce in Oleshky “as a spark in a world of darkness”.
She said her role as “exclusive intermediary” was set out in written agreements signed by both countries, and that she was involved in every stage of the planning, including reviewing de-mining plans and evacuation routes.
Ukrainian representatives presented the US first lady with the Order of Princess Olga, first class, which President Volodymyr Zelenskyy awarded her earlier this week. She also gave the most senior officials present letters she had written to Putin and Zelenskyy.
The six-day truce covered the Russian-occupied city of Oleshky in Ukraine’s Kherson region and the surrounding area, and allowed aid deliveries and the evacuation of nearly 800 people.
An estimated 2,000 civilians had been left in the city. It was the longest multi-day truce between Russia and Ukraine since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022, and the first joint relief operation in four years and eight months.
The White House said Melania Trump mediated the truce, though Pope Leo XIV also pressed both sides to allow aid and evacuations, and that the two accounts of who brokered it have diverged.
The truce expired last Sunday with no extension, a day before a Russian bombing of an aid distribution point in Komyshuvakha, in the Zaporizhia region, killed at least 40 people, according to Ukrainian President Zelenskyy.
New US-brokered talks between Russia and Ukraine are expected to take place in Abu Dhabi on November 10 and 11.
