Washington DC - President Donald Trump suggested Friday it would be premature to give Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, saying as he hosted Volodymyr Zelensky that he hoped to secure peace with Russia first.

"Hopefully, they won't need it. Hopefully we'll be able to get the war over with without thinking about Tomahawks," Trump told journalists, including an AFP reporter, as the two leaders met at the White House.

Trump added that he was confident of getting Russian President Vladimir Putin to end the invasion he launched in 2022, following a phone call with the Kremlin chief a day earlier.

The US and Russian presidents agreed on Thursday to a new summit in the Hungarian capital Budapest, which would be their first since an August meeting in Alaska that failed to produce any kind of peace deal.

"I think that President Putin wants to end the war," Trump said.

But Zelensky, who wore a dark suit for his third meeting with Trump in Washington since the US president's return to power, demurred, saying that Putin was "not ready" for peace.

Ukraine has been lobbying Washington for Tomahawks for weeks, arguing that the missiles could help put pressure on Russia to end its brutal three-and-a-half-year invasion.

But on the eve of Zelensky's visit, Putin warned Trump in a call against delivering the weapons, saying it could escalate the war and jeopardize peace talks.

Trump said the US had to be careful not to "deplete" its own supplies of Tomahawks, which have a range of over 1,000 miles.

Diplomatic talks on ending Russia's invasion have stalled since the Alaska summit.

But Trump, who once said he could end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours, appears set on pursuing a breakthrough to follow the Gaza ceasefire deal that he brokered last week.

The Kremlin said Friday that "many questions" needed resolving before Putin and Trump could meet, including who would be on each negotiating team.

Zelensky's visit to Washington, Ukraine's main military backer, will be his third since Trump returned to office.