What happened at today’s NATO summit?

The NATO summit at The Hague is now over and while Ukraine wasn’t the main item on the agenda, the ongoing war with Russia was still discussed.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy held a series of bilateral talks with foreign leaders, including a meeting with US President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the summit.

The Ukrainian president said he discussed how to achieve a ceasefire and real peace with Trump, adding the meeting was “substantive” and the pair discussed how to “protect our people”.

He also said the two leaders discussed the possible co-production of drones and that he told Trump “the facts of what is happening on the ground”.

Speaking this afternoon, Trump admitted he and Zelenskyy had previously had some “rough times” but that his Ukrainian counterpart “couldn’t have been nicer” today.

He said he will now speak with Vladimir Putin about the war and “see if we can get it ended”, adding that the Russian leader would “like to get out of this thing” and that the war has “been a mess for him”.

Answering a question about whether Putin has any territorial ambitions beyond Ukraine, Trump said “it’s possible”.

He also said he thinks the Russian president has “been misguided” and adds: “I’m very surprised, actually. I thought we should have settled that easily.”

US considering extra Patriots for Ukraine

At one moment during his remarks, Trump was asked a question about the Patriot missile systems by a woman who revealed her husband was serving in the Ukrainian army.

“That’s a very good question,” Trump said. “And I wish you a lot of luck. I mean, I can see it’s very upsetting to you. So say hello to your husband.”

On the question itself, Trump said he is considering sending more Patriot missile batteries to Ukraine to help Kyiv fend off Russian attacks.

He said the air-defence missiles are “very hard to get” but that “we are going to see if we can make some of them available.”

In other Ukraine news…

Senior Democrats have called on Joe Biden to drop out of the presidential race after he called Kamala Harris “vice president Trump” at a Nato summit.

The US President made the blunder in a “make or break” press conference as he attempted to “allay” Democrats’ fears about his re-election bid. An hour earlier, he introduced Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian leader, as “President Putin”.

Jim Himes, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, called on Mr Biden to make way for a “younger successor” just moments after he finished speaking.

The US President needs to protect his “legacy” and is not the “strongest candidate” to take on Donald Trump in November’s election, he said, urging him to “put our nation first”.

He was quickly followed by Scott Peters, a California congressman, who said in a statement: “The stakes are high, and we are on a losing course.”

Eric Sorensen, of Illinois, urged the 81-year-old president to give up the Democratic nomination to a “leader who will stand up to the present threats against democracy”.

Mr Biden, who was repeatedly asked about the state of his re-election bid in the press conference, said he was “determined” to continue his campaign.

He said he could stand down and make way for Ms Harris to take on the nomination, but only if his team told him he could not win the election.

David Axelrod, a former senior adviser to Barack Obama and frequent critic of Mr Biden, said on CNN: “If that’s the case, then they’re not really levelling with him about where this race is… it’s not fair to him if they’re not telling him the truth.”

Mr Biden said he wanted to “allay fears” among Democratic colleagues by doing more campaign events by “letting them see me out there”.

“I’m going out into the areas where we think we can win, where we can persuade people to move our way,” apparently conceding that voters have moved towards Trump since their debate last month.