Zelenskyy’s attempt to get Trump on his side fails - Wall Street Journal
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is trying to get U.S. President Donald Trump on his side by taking a softer approach. However, this task may not be feasible.
This is written by The Wall Street Journal, Censor.NET reports citing UNIAN.
It is noted that Zelenskyy has already agreed to a temporary ceasefire proposed by Trump and signed a mineral agreement with the United States. In addition, the president of Ukraine flew to Turkey for talks, to which he called on Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.
Even this approach brought almost nothing to Zelenskyy, the newspaper believes. After yesterday's conversation with Putin, Trump again switched to the sequence of actions proposed by the Kremlin leader to end the war, and softened his position on Moscow.
When Putin refused to sign the 30-day ceasefire agreement, Trump did not impose new sanctions against Russia, as he had threatened to do, the newspaper recalled. Instead, the US president said that Ukraine and Russia should negotiate with each other.
In addition, Trump's willingness to tolerate Putin's evasion of the ceasefire contrasts with his explosive reaction to Zelenskyy's statement that Russia was not going to end the war, which the Ukrainian leader made during their meeting in the Oval Office in February.
The journalists emphasized that Zelenskyy's willingness to comply with Trump's demands after the failed meeting earned him a new meeting with the US president at the Vatican in late April, where they appeared to make peace. However, the American leader still has a favorable view of Putin.
The publication added that the Russian dictator says that he is open to ending the war, but continues to refuse the initiative of Ukraine and the United States for a temporary truce. He insists that "a number of complex issues need to be resolved" before a pause in the fighting can be made.
Tatiana Stanova, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Russia and Eurasia Center, told reporters that the vague memorandum Putin recently called for is nothing more than a way to offer Trump something the US president could call a Russian concession. She believes that the Kremlin can use this to push through clauses on the termination of Western military aid to Ukraine, as well as Kyiv's renunciation of claims to the occupied territories. According to her, the Russian dictator is confident that the United States will persuade Ukraine to fulfill some of Moscow's demands.
"Putin will fight for Ukraine by any means necessary until the day he dies. He is absolutely obsessed. He believes that if Russia doesn't get its way in Ukraine, it faces its own destruction. And one way or another, he believes he will get his way," Stanova summarized.
