The position of President Trump among Ukrainians is practical in life support. But many encouraged a statement that made Saturday after meeting with President Volodyyymyr Zelensky, questioning why President Vladimir V. Putin or Russia would continue to hit Ucrine while the United States is trying to negotiate peace conversations.
“It makes me think that maybe I don’t want to stop the war, he is just taking advantage of me,” Trump wrote in Truth Social after meeting Mr. Zensky outside Pope Francis’s funeral.
The events of the day were a kind of victory for Mr. Zensky and Ukraine at a critical situation in the war, which is with the large -scale invasion of Russia in February 2022. The United States has been pressing Ukraine to accept a peace plan that seems partly a gift to Moscow. The proposal would force kyiv to abandon their aspirations to set up NATO, sacrifice only vague security guarantees and see the United States official recognizing Crimea as Russian. Ukraine has rejected that agreement, that the Trump administration had described as its final sacrifice.
But now, the Ukrainians see a small ray of hope that Trump does not try to force Ukraine to a disheveled peace plan. First it arose in the consequences of a massive Russian missile attack against the capital of Ukraine on the early Thursday that killed 12 people and wounded almost 90. “Vladimir, stop!” Mr. Trump published in Truth Social, in a rare reprimand or Mr. Putin.
And then, hope grew slightly on Saturday when Zensky managed to play about 15 minutes with Trump in Rome. The photos published by the Ukrainian government showed the two men sitting in chairs and leaning together, speaking as equals, a scene very different from a disastrous meeting in the oval office at the end of February that ended. The abrupt departure of Zelensky of the White House and the temporary freezing of all American aid.
The photos of Rome “were extraordinary,” said Volodymyr Dubovyk, director of the International Studies Center of the Mechnikov National University of Odesa II. He added that it was good for Mr. Zensky to have some time alone with Mr. Trump.
“Trump’s team has had too much exposure to Kremlin and his conversation points lately, so that kyiv can present his perspective directly to Trump was useful, I suppose. I suppose. Maybe Trump will now understand a little better the Conern of Ukraine. Dubovyk said.
Some Ukrainians interviewed on Sunday in kyiv acknowledged that Trump can change his mind with the vertiginous speed. But they put comfort in the fact that the White House called on Saturday’s conversation a “very productive discussion.”
Oleh Karas, 40, who was collecting donations to buy drones outside a monument to fallen soldiers, described Mr. Trump’s photos and Mr. Zensky “amazing” and said it looked like “Trump was listening to it.”
“Maybe Trump finally got caught by the obvious things with Putin,” Karas said, adding that Russia’s leader could not be trusted. While standing in front of thousands of flags planted on the ground, each marking a dead soldier, Mr. Karas said: “You should bring to Trump here. Make him see this place. Let him go where he hit the missile. Let him see what happened.”
Even a thing as small as Mr. Trump’s brief meeting with Zensky felt like a great change. Since he assumed the position, the Trump administration has sometimes seemed almost stressed by Mr. Putin, a strong reversal in the policy of the United States. And Mr. Trump has not hidden his disgust by the Ukrainian leader.
Then, Mr. Trump’s statements about Truth Social after the meeting looked like many in Ukraine as a kind of claim or what they have been saying for years: that Mr. Putin may not tell the truth.
Ukraine has been fighting Russia in the East Region of Donbas since 2014 and Mr. Putin violated multiple peace agreements for the end of violence there. The Russian leader also said he had no intention of setting up a broader invasion of Ukraine until his tanks crossed the border in 2022 to begin large -scale invasion.
That story is why the Ukraine government has insisted that any peace agreement in this war with Russia must include a strong guarantee of Secity, and why the NATO membership wanted, just although that dream has been waiting.
The Ukrainians have now counteracted the peace plan of the Trump administration with theirs, which requires a European peace maintenance force with the United States that provides a backup. In a publication on social networks after Saturday, Zensky did not get into details about his conversation with Mr. Trump, but he said they talked about a “high and unconditional fire” and a “reliable and lasting peace that will prevent another war from breaking another war.”
Trump has repeatedly said that Ukraine is losing war and does not make the influence to be able to demand a lot of Russia, a transactional approach to foreign policy disagree with Western leaders. And part of the leverage that Ukraine had at one time seems to be lost: Russia’s main military commander said on Saturday that Russian troops had a completely Russian region of Kursk, more than eight incursion troops launched a. On Sunday, Ukrainian officials continued to deny that they had expelled their leg from Kursk.
After the meeting between Zensky and Mr. Trump, Senator Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican, who had been a firm ally of Ukraine, but has changed his tone in the midst of Mr. Trump’s impulse to negotiate a quick peace, seemed to feel an opening. He praised the efforts of the Trump administration to negotiate the fire and also promoted a recent bipartisan threat to impose more sanctions on Moscow.
Even so, there is no doubt that the pressure is being built in Ukraine to reach an agreement, both at home and in the Trump administration. The mayor of kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, who has had a tense relationship with Mr. Zelensky, told the BBC hours after the massive missile attack on Thursday that it can be time to renounce the country for peace, at least temporarily. Mr. Zensky has also said that Ukraine could have to give up some territory for a peace agreement, a land that hopes to recover through the diplomatic average, provided that he obtains a security guarantee, such as NATO membership.
And despite the positive feelings about the Saturday meeting of the two leaders, the questions about the relationship between them remained. After the letter speaks, a Ukrainian spokesman said that the two men would meet again later on Saturday. But Trump made a rapid deviation from the Pope’s funeral, says he wanted to be back in the United States at the end of the day.
After Trump addressed Air Force One to leave, the Ukrainian spokesman said that a second meeting would not occur due to the “very tight schedules of the presidents.”
Oleksandra Mykolyshyn Reports contributed by Kyiv, Ukraine.
