Zelenskiy told the media in a WhatsApp chat that Kyiv was committed to continuing talks on how to end the conflict with Russia and he was ready to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in any format.

US President Donald Trump said on Sunday he and Zelenskiy were "maybe very close" to an agreement to end the conflict although "thorny" territorial issues lingered. He said they were 95% of the way to such an agreement and that he expected European countries to "take over a big part" of that effort with U.S. backing.

On Tuesday, Russia said its negotiating stance would toughen after it accused Kyiv of attacking one of Putin's Russian presidential residences - an allegation that Kyiv said was baseless and intended to scuttle arduous peace talks.

The White House had no comment on the issue of dispatching US troops to Ukraine under any peace settlement with Russia.