WASHINGTON

US President Donald Trump held out hope Friday that he will meet again with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, after a summit in Budapest, Hungary was abruptly called off last month.

"There is always a chance," Trump said in response to a reporter's question as he hosted Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban at the White House.

The US president later said in the Cabinet Room that the reason the sit-down did not materialize is because the Russians "don't want to stop yet."

"I think they will. I think that's it's taken a big toll on Russia, big toll on both countries, obviously, but it's taken a big toll," he said.

Asked if he would like to maintain Budapest as the locale for any potential future sit-down with Putin, Trump responded affirmatively.

"I'd like to keep it in Hungary, in Budapest. That meeting, it turned out I didn't want to do that meeting because I didn't think anything was going to be happening of significance. But if we have it, I'd like to do it in Budapest, yeah, it'd be good," he said.

Trump and Putin last met in Alaska on Aug. 15, and decided to hold talks in Budapest following consultations between their top diplomats. But a call between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that was expected to lay the groundwork for their meeting instead led to the upending of the summit altogether.

The Kremlin said Wednesday that the conditions for the presidential tete-a-tete remain unmet.

"Any summit meeting requires in-depth preparation and careful consideration of all aspects. As of today, neither the first nor the second condition for organizing this meeting has been met," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said at a meeting in the State Duma.

The diplomat noted that while the Russian and American foreign ministries are engaged in preparatory work, the immediate priority is to add specifics to the framework agreed upon by the leaders during their August summit in the US state of Alaska.