WATCH: Trump meets with Norwegian prime minister at White House

President Donald Trump offered a more optimistic tone about prospects for a Ukraine-Russia peace deal agreement than he did in social media postings earlier Thursday, when he leveled rare criticism against Russian President Vladimir Putin, or on Wednesday, when he sharply criticized Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who pushed back against a U.S. proposal that included Kyiv ceding the territory Russia has seized.

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“There’s a lot of very bad blood, a lot of distrust, but … I hope we’re going to get there for the sake of a lot of young people that are dying,” the president said at the start of a lunch with visiting Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre.

“I have my own deadline, and we want it to be fast,” Trump added.