US President Donald Trump could meet Vladimir Putin as soon as next week, a White House official says.

The development came as the US continued preparations to impose secondary sanctions, including potentially on China, to pressure Moscow to end the war in Ukraine.

Such a face-to-face meeting would be the first between a sitting US and Russian president since Joe Biden met Putin in Geneva in June 2021, some eight months before Russia launched the biggest attack on a European nation since World War II.

Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky have not met since December 2019 and make no secret of their contempt for each other.

The New York Times reported that Trump told European leaders during a call on Wednesday, US time, he intended to meet with Putin and then follow up with a trilateral involving the Russian leader and Zelensky.

“There’s a good chance that there will be a meeting very soon,” Trump said.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said: “The Russians expressed their desire to meet with President Trump, and the President is open to meeting with both President Putin and President Zelensky.”

The details emerged following a meeting on Wednesday between Putin and US special envoy Steve Witkoff that Trump described as having achieved “great progress” in a Truth Social post, although later said he would not call it a breakthrough.

A Kremlin aide said the talks were “useful and constructive”.

The diplomatic manoeuvres come two days before a deadline set by Trump for Russia to agree to peace in Ukraine or face further sanctions.

Trump has appeared increasingly frustrated with Putin over the lack of progress towards peace and has threatened to impose heavy tariffs on countries that buy Russian exports, including oil.

Trump on Wednesday also said he could announce further tariffs on China similar to the 25 per cent duties announced earlier on India over its purchases of Russian oil.

“We did it with India. We’re doing it probably with a couple of others. One of them could be China,” he said.

The White House official earlier said that while the meeting between Witkoff and Putin had gone well and Moscow was eager to continue engaging with the US, secondary sanctions that Trump had threatened against nations doing business with Russia were still expected to be implemented on Friday.

Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov said the two sides had exchanged “signals” on the Ukraine issue and discussed the possibility of developing strategic co-operation between Moscow and Washington. He declined to give more details until Witkoff had reported back to Trump.

Zelensky said he believed pressure had worked on Russia and Moscow was now more “inclined” to a ceasefire.

“The pressure on them works. But the main thing is that they do not deceive us in the details – neither us nor the US,” Zelensky said in his nightly address.

Trump on Truth Social said he had updated some of Washington’s European allies following Witkoff’s meeting.

A German government spokesperson said Trump provided information about the status of the talks with Russia during a call with the German chancellor and other European leaders.

Trump took a key step toward punitive measures on Wednesday when he imposed an additional 25 per cent tariff on imports from India, citing New Delhi’s continued imports of Russian oil.

The measure raises tariffs on some Indian goods to as high as 50 per cent, among the steepest faced by any US trading partner. India’s external affairs ministry called the decision “extremely unfortunate”.

The Kremlin says threats to penalise countries that trade with Russia are illegal.