Ahead of the much anticipated call, leaders from Britain, France, Germany and Italy said they spoke Sunday with Trump, after Russia and Ukraine remained far apart in direct talks last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
President Donald Trump<\/a> is set to speak Monday with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin,\u2002<\/a>in what the U.S. president said is an attempt to stop the \u201cbloodbath\u201d of the war in Ukraine.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump said the call would be taking place at 10 a.m. \u2014 although he did not specify whether this was on eastern daylight time or in another time zone. The American president said he would also be speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy,\u2002<\/a>as well as members of NATO.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Ahead of the much anticipated Trump-Putin call, leaders from Britain, France, Germany and Italy said they spoke Sunday with Trump. The British government said in a statement that it was urging \u201cPutin to take peace talks seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Those leaders \u201calso discussed the use of sanctions if Russia failed to engage seriously in a ceasefire and peace talks,\u201d the statement said \u2014 something the American president has previously threatened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cTomorrow, President Putin must show he wants peace by accepting the 30-day unconditional ceasefire proposed by President Trump and backed by Ukraine and Europe,\u201d French President Emanuel Macron said in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While the diplomatic activity carries on, the violence in Ukraine continues. Russia has continued its near nightly drone and missile attacks on Ukrainian civilians, more than three years after it launched a full-scale invasion and tried to seize Kyiv.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On Sunday, Russia shelled residential neighborhoods of the eastern Ukrainian city of Kherson, killing one 75-year-old woman and injuring two others, the city council posted on the Telegram messaging site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump said in a Truth Social post Saturday that he would be speaking with Putin at 10 a.m. Monday with the purpose of \u201cstopping the \u2018bloodbath\u2019 that is killing, on average, more than 5,000 Russian and Ukrainian soldiers a week.\u201d NBC News has not independently verified the numbers that Trump cited.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Putin\u2019s spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed to Russian state media Saturday that the call would be taking place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Apparently referring both to his planned call with Putin and his slated talks with Zelenskyy and other European leaders, Trump added that \u201chopefully it will be a productive day, a ceasefire will take place, and this very violent war, a war that should have never happened, will end.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Despite promising on multiple occasions to end the war in 24 hours, Trump has since found the reality much different since beginning his second term in office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n