Hello and welcome to Newsar from the BBC World Service, coming to you live from our studios in central London.

I'm Julian Marshall.

After famously pledging during his election campaign that he could end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours,

Donald Trump, nearly four months into his term, will have discovered that this is one

obstacle that he cannot overcome with an executive presidential order. A flurry of diplomatic

activity last month resulted in Ukraine and Russia agreeing to a 30-day ceasefire, but with Russia

demanding such impossible conditions, it never happened.

Since when it's all gone quiet, apart from the signs of growing U.S. impatience with Russia's foot-dragging,

and only today President Trump said that Russia needs to get moving and is reported to be considering further sanctions

unless Russia agrees to a ceasefire by the end of this month.

So what, if anything, will come of a meeting today,

their third between U.S. envoy Steve Whitkoff and President Putin

in St. Petersburg, his spokesman at Dmitri Peskov warned not to expect any breakthroughs.

The meticulous work continues. We are exchanging views, conveying our positions.

It's meticulous work. Breakthroughs are not expected.

The process of normalization of relations is ongoing.

We are looking for the basis to establish the trajectory of the Ukrainian settlement.

And that meeting has now ended with no word on its outcome.

Meanwhile, a meeting of Ukraine's allies in Brussels

has pledged another $24 billion in military aid for Ukraine,

the German defense minister Boris Pistorius, said Russia's actions were proved that Kiv's

military needed the maximum support from its allies.

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