Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy arrived in the Turkish capital Ankara on Thursday for a meeting with President Tayyip Erdogan, while in Istanbul Russian and Ukranian officials were separately expected to begin peace talks.

Last weekend saw a flurry of diplomatic activity surrounding the war in Ukraine. First, European leaders assembled in Kyiv on Saturday with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a show of unity to put pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin for a ceasefire.

For days, President Donald Trump repeatedly floated the possibility of scrapping his Middle East travel schedule — one his team meticulously crafted for weeks — and adding a stop to personally mediate Ukraine-Russia peace talks in Turkey.