Trump denied that he pressured Zelenskyy to agree to cede entire Donbas region to Russia, - Reuters
President of the United States Donald Trump said that he did not force Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to agree to the transfer of the entire Donbas to the Russian Federation.
According to Censor.NET, Reuters reported this with reference to three sources familiar with the negotiations.
According to the agency, the meeting between Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy, which took place on Friday, was held in a tense atmosphere. The agency's interlocutors said that the talks ended with Trump's position on "a deal where we are". In other words, he meant freezing the armed conflict on the current demarcation lines.
"We think they should just stop at the lines where they are," Trump told reporters on board Air Force One on Sunday, 19 October.
At the same time, he categorically denied that he had allegedly offered Zelenskyy to hand over the entire Donbas to Russia.
"Let it be divided the way it is now. It is already divided. In my opinion, about 78 per cent of this territory is already under Russian control," the US president said.
At the same time, Trump added that the parties could agree on "something later," hinting at the possibility of further talks between Kyiv and Moscow.
The meeting with Trump disappointed the Ukrainian delegation
According to the agency's sources, the results of the meeting were disappointing for the Ukrainian delegation. Ukraine's president had hoped to convince the US leader to provide Kyiv with long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles capable of hitting targets deep inside Russia. However, according to US Vice President J.D. Vance on Sunday, Trump has not yet made a final decision on this issue.
Several sources stressed that the conversation between the presidents was far from diplomatic. One source said that the conversation itself was quite bad. Trump's main message was a threat that Ukraine would freeze in the winter and be completely destroyed if it did not agree to a deal with Russia. Another source clarified that the word "destroyed" was not literally used, but confirmed that Trump used profanity several times.
Trump's position was again influenced by Putin
Reuters' interlocutors have the impression that the US president's position was largely determined by his previous conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin the day before.
According to the Financial Times, during this conversation, Putin proposed a so-called "territorial swap": Ukraine would give up Donetsk and Luhansk regions in exchange for small parts of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions.
Giving up these territories, according to one of Reuters' interlocutors, would make the rest of Ukraine much more vulnerable to further Russian attacks and would be effectively tantamount to "suicide".
Among US officials, Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff reportedly put particularly strong pressure on the Ukrainian side. According to one of the sources, he appealed to the fact that a significant part of the Russian-speaking population lives in Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
