ROME — President Donald Trump said Saturday that he doubts Russia's Vladimir Putin wants to end his war in Ukraine, expressing new skepticism that a peace deal can be reached soon. Only a day earlier, Trump had said Ukraine and Russia were “very close to a deal."

President Trump on Saturday said he thinks Russian President Vladimir Putin may be stringing him along after the latest deadly strikes on Ukraine, as the U.S. seeks to bring an end to the war in

Putin and Zelenskyy face pressure from Trump administration, which has threatened to walk away from peace efforts unless some progress is achieved.

US President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky held crunch war talks in the heart of the Vatican minutes before the start of the funeral of Pope Francis on Saturday, as the White House mounts an increasingly urgent push to strike a peace deal in Ukraine.

Donald Trump criticised Vladimir Putin for attacks on Ukrainian civilian areas, suggesting a change in approach through sanctions. This came after Trump's meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Rome, their first in-person encounter since February.

It marked the world leaders’ Zelenskyy’s office released a striking image for the history books of him and Trump sitting knee-to-knee in St. Peter’s Basilica. “I think that Pope Francis would have been filled with hope,