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Donald Trump has signaled that there should be elections in Ukraine as part of a peace agreement with Russia in his first public comments after the United States had talks with Moscow in Riyadh.
In comments critically against the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s handling of the WarThe US President said: “It was a long time ago that we had a choice in Ukraine.” “This is not a matter of Russia. That comes from me and comes from many other countries, ”he said reporters in his Mar-Lago resort in Florida.
“You have a tour (in Ukraine). Now this has allowed a war that should never have happened before,” he added and compared the Ukrainian cities with “demolition pages”.
“These cities look like Gaza,” he said with “most cities.
The President mentioned the role of Russia in the destruction of the Ukrainian cities and cities during his complete invasion-Des greatest armed conflict on European soil since World War II.
Zelenskyy’s term of office expired last year, but Kyiv said that she can only hold a choice after the fights stops and war law is lifted.
David Arakhamia, head of the government party of Zelenskyy in parliament, said this month that the elections should not be held six months ago after the termination of war law.
Holding elections would be a huge challenge because millions of Ukrainians are sold, live abroad or live in areas under the Russian line -up. Kyiv has also expressed security concerns regarding all surveys and said that western peace troops or a security forces would be necessary to ensure the safety of voters.
A survey The Ukrainian, carried out by the non -profit International Republican Institute in September and October in September and October, found that 60 percent of the respondents held a vote of the President during the war. Around 52 percent stated that they did not support the vote for a new parliament during the conflict.
There are widespread fears In Kyiv and all over Europe, Trump wants to regulate war against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s conditions. The United States has already made Putin considerable concessions by having deleted the wishes of Ukraine to join NATO and restore its control over Russian -occupied country.
Trump said he was “more confident” after reaching a peace agreement in Ukraine The United States is talking to Russia in Riad on Tuesday, which he thought was “very good”.
Marco Rubio, the US Foreign Minister, and Sergei Lavrov, the foreign minister of Russia, led the delegations in a four and a half hour meetings in the Saudi capital.
Afterwards they agreed to “lay the foundation for future cooperation” in order to end the Ukraine secretary, and a flash normalization of relationships after their first high conversations about the conflict since Putin’s invasion in February 2022.
Zelenskyy said Reject any agreement This does not affect Kyiv. “We don’t want peace that is conveyed behind the scenes without our commitment,” he said. “Peace cannot be achieved without Ukraine”.
The US President also said that he was “very disappointed” that the Ukraine “is annoyed that he had no place in the Riad talks and had breeded Kyiv to not have ended the war.” Well, you have A place for three years, this could have been done very easily long before, “said Trump.
He also said he would support European peace troops In Ukraine after the war, although Lavrov said on Tuesday that every European peace security operation in the country would be “unacceptable”.
“If you want to do that, it’s great. I am all for it if you want to do that “and” would not get any objection at all, “said Trump reporters.
He added that he did not want to pull all US troops out of Europe as part of a peace agreement. “Nobody asks that, so I don’t think we would have to do that. I wouldn’t want to do that. But this question never really arose. “
When Trump hammered the leadership of Zelenskyy, he claimed that the approval rate of his college was 4 percent.
An opinion survey The Kyiv International Institute of Sociology in December found that 52 percent of Ukrainians trusted Zelenskyy.
“I like him personally,” said Trump about Zelenskyy. “He’s fine. But I don’t care “personally”. It is important to me to do the job. “
Additional reporting by James Politi in Washington
