Hello and welcome to NewsHour. It's coming to you live from the BBC World Service in London. I'm Tim Franks.

We're beginning with a war in Ukraine, a conflict which for a while we've been talking about as a war of attrition, grinding, often slow advances counted in large numbers of casualties but relatively small gains and losses in territory.

How different then the pace of diplomacy around the war now. Donald Trump appears to be a man in a hurry,

and he's been expecting a rapid and positive response from the Russian president, Vladimir Putin,

to that proposal of a 30-day ceasefire,

which his top officials came up with after talks earlier this week with their Ukrainian counterparts.

So today there was huge interest over what President Putin would have to say publicly for the first time about that plan.

At a news conference in Moscow, the Russian leader gave what might

best be described as a yes but to the ceasefire idea. The but came in a series of questions

Mr Putin listed. Who will decide how and where there's been a possible violation of any

ceasefire agreement over a distance of 2,000 kilometers.

And then, who will be blamed for violating the ceasefire?

All these questions need to be carefully studied by both sides.

So the idea itself is good, and we absolutely support it,

but there are issues that we need to discuss.

And I think we need to negotiate with our American colleagues and partners.

Maybe a phone call with President Trump to discuss it,

but the idea of ending this conflict by peaceful means, we support that.

So some caution from President, excuse me, from Mr Putin.

He was speaking ahead of a meeting this evening, Moscow time,

with Steve Whitkoff, Donald Trump's special envoy. The Russian leader also emphasized that any ceasefire should lead to a long-lasting peace and would have to deal with what he

called the root causes of the conflict. How are these comments likely to go down in the White

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