WASHINGTON — President Trump said he held a “very good” hourlong call with his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, on Wednesday — one day after Russian President Vladimir Putin rejected an unconditional 30-day cease-fire that Washington and Kyiv agreed to last week.

“Much of the discussion was based on the call made yesterday with President Putin in order to align both Russia and Ukraine in terms of their requests and needs,” Trump said on Truth Social after the conversation wrapped. “We are very much on track.”

Zelensky also raved about the Trump chat, calling it “a positive, very substantive, and frank conversation” in a post to X, adding that “together with America, with President Trump, and under American leadership, lasting peace can be achieved this year.”

“I thanked him for a good and productive start to the work of the Ukrainian and American teams in Jeddah on March 11—this meeting of the teams significantly helped in moving toward ending the war,” he said. “We agreed that Ukraine and the United States should continue working together to achieve a real end to the war and lasting peace.” 

During the call, Trump and Zelensky also discussed the return of Ukrainian children forcibly taken by Russians, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters at an afternoon briefing. 

The youths’ return was a key part of Trump’s cease-fire proposal, but was not mentioned in either Washington or Moscow’s readouts of the Tuesday call.

“President Trump also asked President Zelensky about the children who had gone missing from Ukraine during the war, including the ones that had been abducted,” she said. “President Trump promised to work closely with both parties to help make sure those children were returned home.”

Special Presidential Envoy to Ukraine Gen. Keith Kellogg told Fox News he was “amazed” when Trump brought up the “very substantive conversation about bringing those children back,” saying it spoke to his “understanding of the details.” 

“They got into levels of discussion that most people don’t talk about: He wasn’t talking about the territory of Luhansk or Donetsk or Zaporizhzhia (or) the Kherson Oblast — he was talking about the children [with Zelensky],” Kellogg said. “He was talking about ending the war, he was talking about the carnage and how to end all that. And this is where that conversation went, very positive.”

Leavitt also confirmed the US would continue sending military aid to Ukraine and sharing intelligence after the Kremlin in its readout Tuesday said Putin “emphasized … the complete cessation of foreign military aid and the provision of intelligence information to Kyiv” in that call.

Trump and National Security Adviser Mike Waltz each denied aid was discussed in the Putin call, but the administration has avoided answering questions about whether Russian officials were lying in their readout.

While Putin rejected Trump’s overarching proposal, he agreed in their call yesterday to an immediate pause in attacks on energy infrastructure. However, Russia broke the restricted cease-fire within hours of its announcement.

While the Kremlin’s readout of the Tuesday call with Trump claimed Putin “immediately” ordered his military to adhere to the limited cease-fire, Zelensky on Wednesday said the claim was “very much at odds with reality” following a series of drone attacks across Ukraine. 

The Trump administration in turn decried Russia’s overnight attacks — which left half the town of Sloviansk in the Donetsk region without power.

“Attacks like these are precisely why President Trump is committed to peace,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce told reporters Wednesday. “It is time for the death and destruction to stop and for an end to this senseless war.” 

“We cannot get to the table for negotiations to end the war without a cease-fire in place,” she added. “The shooting has to stop first.”

Moscow sought the “energy infrastructure” cease-fire after Ukraine targeted multiple Russian oil facilities in recent weeks.

“Putin likely made the deal with Russian energy infrastructure front of mind,” the Atlantic Center’s Alexander “Sandy” Vershbow said in a statement Wednesday.  

Despite the Russian strikes on energy infrastructure after agreeing to the limited cease-fire, Kellogg expressed optimism that Moscow would hold up to their promise in the future.

“Cease-fires are a little bit messy at the start. They’re going to calm down. Both sides are going to get together,” he said. 

“This is the one area where a cease-fire would benefit Russia more than Ukraine, given Kyiv’s expanding capacity for long-range drone attacks on Russian energy targets,” said Vershbow, who previously served as US ambassador to Russia under George W. Bush.

The US is planning additional talks with Russia and Ukraine, with an American delegation headed to Riyadh “in the coming days” to continue negotiations, Bruce said.

Those negotiations will involve discussing what outcomes each party ultimately seeks as the US continues to push Russia to accept Trump’s full cease-fire proposal.

“You’re going into these complex negotiations hopefully starting next week in Saudi Arabia, you come with your term sheets — what it looks like at the end — and then you go to a comprehensive ceasefire,” Kellogg said. “I think it’s going to occur. It’s going to happen.”

However, any meetings would not likely be held with all parties at the table. While Kyiv wants to participate in discussions alongside the US and Russia, Putin has demanded only one-on-one calls with Washington, forcing the Trump administration to act as the go-between.

“Shuttle diplomacy is difficult,” Waltz said Wednesday. “It’s tough, but we are going back and forth at every level driving both sides toward a cease-fire and driving both sides toward the end of this war.”