Zelenskyy and Putin should deal with Ukraine war settlement themselves, Trump says
US President Donald Trump said he would not object if the leaders of Ukraine and Russia reached peace in the war on their own, without Washington’s involvement. He claimed he had brought the parties to these talks himself.
He said this to journalists aboard Air Force One, Censor.NET reports.
On a meeting between Zelenskyy and Putin
The US leader expressed confidence that the compromises prepared by his administration would force the parties to sit down at the negotiating table in the near future.
"Let them deal. I am the one who got them to this position and I think that's going to get worked out. I think we’re getting close to the point where the issue between Russia and Ukraine should be resolved." Trump said.
According to Trump, US Vice President JD Vance, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other senior US officials are ready to join the track for settling the war.
Aid manipulation and criticism of Biden
At the same time, Trump again shifted the focus to the financial side of the issue, recalling that Washington is no longer incurring losses for free because of its support for Kyiv.
"You know, we are not spending money. They are actually buying equipment from us at full price. Biden gave them everything, just gave them hundreds of billions of dollars of weapons and everything else," the current US leader complained, once again criticizing his predecessor in the White House.
He repeated that this war "should never have happened", but that it now has to be ended.
As an argument, Trump again cited his own estimates of frontline losses (without distinguishing between Ukrainian and Russian forces), putting the figure at 25,000 killed over the past month and summing up that such a number of victims is absolutely "unacceptable".
Background
- On 4 June, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy published an open letter to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, in which he proposed a meeting.
- In the letter, Zelenskyy proposed ending the war "in a format between us and you" and setting a clear date for the meeting. Among the countries that could host such a meeting, the head of state named Switzerland, Turkey and countries of the Arab world.
- Ukraine is ready to fully cease fire for the duration of the negotiations, and the United States could provide monitoring.
- The Ukrainian president believes that a full exchange of prisoners of war under the all-for-all principle could be a good prologue to ending the war. Zelenskyy also stressed steps to return civilians and children who were taken away during the war.
- On June 5, Putin said he had "briefly" read Zelenskyy’s open letter in the morning and had "never refused" to meet the Ukrainian president, but was against "engaging in pointless talk" and "saw no point" in direct negotiations now.
