Behind closed-door meetings at White House, US President Donald Trump urged his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, to accept Vladimir Putin’s terms to end the war, warning that Russia would “destroy” Ukraine if it refused.The meeting between the US and Ukrainian leaders on Friday descended several times into a “shouting match”, with Trump “cursing all the time”, according to Financial Times.
What happened in the meeting between Trump and Zelenskyy?
In the meeting, US president discarded maps of the frontline in Ukraine, insisted Zelenskyy surrender the entire Donbas region to Putin, and repeatedly echoed talking points that the Russian leader had made during their call the day before.
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The meeting occurred amid a renewed push by Trump to end Russia’s war following the ceasefire secured between Israel and Hamas. Zelenskyy and his team visited the White House hoping to persuade Trump to supply them with long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles. However, the US president ultimately declined to do so. During Friday’s meeting, Trump appeared to have adopted many of Putin’s talking points verbatim, even when they contradicted his own recent statements about Russia’s weaknesses, European officials briefed on the meeting said. According to a European official with knowledge of the meeting, Trump told Zelenskyy that Putin had told him the conflict was a “special operation, not even a war”, adding that the Ukrainian leader needed to cut a deal or face destruction. The official said that Trump told Zelenskyy he was losing the war, warning: “If [Putin] wants it, he will destroy you.”At one point in the meeting, the US president threw Ukraine’s maps of the battlefield aside, the official familiar with the encounter said. According to the official, Trump said he was “sick” of seeing the map of the frontline of Ukraine repeatedly. “This red line, I don’t even know where this is. I’ve never been there,” Trump said, according to the official.Trump also said that Russia’s economy is “doing great”, the official said, in a sharp contrast to his recent public remarks in which he urged Putin to negotiate because his “economy is going to collapse”.
Trump proposes swap?
Trump appeared influenced by a Thursday call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, in which Putin proposed a territorial swap. According to The Washington Post, the plan would see Ukraine cede the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk in exchange for small parts of the southern regions of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.US officials presented essentially the same swap to Zelenskyy during a Friday meeting. Ukrainians view the territories they still control in Donetsk and Luhansk as strategically critical, warning that surrendering them would leave the rest of Ukraine far more vulnerable to Russian offensives. One official described giving up western Donetsk and Luhansk as akin to “suicide.”Reuters reported that US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff was among the officials most forcefully pushing Ukraine to accept the proposal. Witkoff reportedly emphasized that Donetsk and Luhansk have large Russian-speaking populations, a point he has made publicly in previous statements.
Zelenskyy urges allies against appeasing Russia
Zelenskyy on Sunday called on allies not to appease Russia, following a US trip in which he failed to secure long-range Tomahawk missile supplies. Zelenskyy had traveled to Washington hoping to leverage growing US frustration with Putin after a stalled summit in Alaska. However, he left empty-handed as President Donald Trump pursues a fresh diplomatic breakthrough following last week’s Gaza ceasefire. “Ukraine will never grant terrorists any bounty for their crimes, and we count on our partners to uphold this very position,” Zelenskyy wrote on social media upon returning home. He also called for “decisive steps” from European and American allies and urged another meeting of the European-led “coalition of the willing.” Recent data from Germany’s Kiel Institute shows foreign military support to Ukraine fell by 43% in July and August compared with the first half of the year. The decline is partly attributed to Nato’s Prioritised Ukraine Requirements List (PURL), which pools European contributions for US-made weapons but excludes direct American financing.
