Jo McKenna: Italy Correspondent on the possibility of the Vatican hosting peace talks between Russia and Ukraine

Donald Trump says the Vatican's 'very interested' in hosting negotiations between Ukraine and Russia. 

The US President's held two separate phone calls today, one with Russian President Vladimir Putin and the other with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. 

He says Ukraine and Russia will immediately start working towards a ceasefire, and more importantly, an end to war. 

Europe Correspondent Jo McKenna told Mike Hosking Pope Leo XIV has had a flurry of diplomatic meetings following his recent inauguration.   

She says he may be set to host peace talks, so Trump may be heading to Rome. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Joe McKinnon's doing the Tuesday business for us. Joe morning
to you, Good morning mate. Tell you this Leo Off.
He's out of the blocks and running, isn't it.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
He's on the move. He's been having a flurry of
diplomatic meetings. He had his big inauguration on Sunday, which
you might have seen two hundred thousand people around Saint
Peter's Square for that major event, and some world leaders
and royalty there as well, of course, so he's very busy,
but a big day to day. He met Vice President
j d Vance and Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State,

(00:32):
and several other leaders today, including the Australian Prime Minister
Antony alban As.

Speaker 1 (00:37):
Indeed, he did Trump sent him a letter, so he's
presumably going to the White House at some point.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
Yeah. I'm just wondering if we might see Donald Trump
over this side of the pond first, because after that
historic phone call he had today with Vladimir Persian, the
Russian President, there was a big phone call between Georgia
Maloney and mccron and Mertz from Joe and in the
statement that I saw from Maloney's office just five minutes ago,

(01:05):
there was a suggestion that Pope Leo may host those
piece talks at the Vaticans, so we might see Trump
over here.

Speaker 1 (01:12):
Do you get the vibe out of those phone calls
I've read what's been said is are there piece talks
to be held? I mean, we held out for Turkey
last week and nothing happened.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
Yeah, we seem to be going round in circles, don't we.
And I don't know that President Zelenski's any more confident.
But he was shaking a few hands here. He was
here for the inauguration and he had a private meeting
with the Pope as well. So let's have to well,
I guess we'll just have to wait and see on that.

Speaker 1 (01:37):
I suppose the other big news of the day, of course,
is the EU UK thing. I mean, from the EU's
point of view, it's got a bit of the old ass.
It took you a while to come back, didn't it.
A I mean, I suppose the fallout is really going
to be in the UK.

Speaker 2 (01:49):
Yeah, I mean the British five Minister Kis Darma has
hailed this agreement as a win win, but reading between
the lines, it looks like the UK has really caved in.
Particularly are on the issue of fishing rights.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
I mean, how do you how is you you've voted
to leave and if you're a British fisherman, the Europeans
are still in there and now for another twelve years.
How do you sell that domestically?

Speaker 2 (02:14):
Yeah, I mean we've seen a pushback already right across
the board from the Conservatives and also Labor MPs. I
noticed former Prime Minister Boris Johnson has also been accusing
Starmer of being a Brussels gimp and selling out, so
exactly so.

Speaker 1 (02:31):
There's a lot of worder to go into that particular
bridg Joe good to catch up. We'll see on Thursday.
Appreciate it very much, Sir Catherine's wife Sai Joe doing
the business out of Europe for us this morning.

Speaker 2 (02:38):
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