TRUMP WANTS UKRAINE ELECTION
Trump has upended US foreign policy since coming to office last month, making support for Ukraine dependent on access to its rare minerals while echoing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s positions on the conflict.
In his press conference on Tuesday, Trump pressed Zelenskyy to hold elections, one of Moscow’s key demands for a peace deal.
“It’s been a long time since we’ve had an election,” said Trump.
“That’s not a Russian thing, that’s something coming from me, from other countries.”
Zelenskyy was elected in 2019 for a five-year term but has remained leader under martial law imposed following the Russian invasion.
Trump also claimed the Ukrainian leader’s approval rating was “at four per cent”.
Zelenskyy’s popularity has eroded since the war began, but the percentage of Ukrainians who trust him has never dipped below 50 per cent since the invasion, according to the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).
Borys Filatov, the mayor of the Ukrainian city of Dnipro, appeared to push back at Trump’s comments.
“We may or may not like Zelenskyy. We can scold him or we can praise him. We can condemn his actions or applaud them. Because he is OUR President,” he said.
“And not a single lying creature in Moscow, Washington, or anywhere else has the right to open their mouths against him.”
Trump’s latest remarks are unlikely to allay fears among some European leaders, already worried Washington will make serious concessions to Moscow and re-write the continent’s security arrangement in a Cold War-style deal.
In Paris, France’s President Emmanuel Macron was to host another meeting in Paris on Ukraine on Wednesday. In comments on Tuesday to the French media after the US-Russia talks, he suggested Trump could restart “useful dialogue” with Putin.
RUSSIAN STRIKES
Kellog’s arrival came hours after Russian strikes in the southern Ukrainian city of Odesa overnight left tens of thousands of people without power, Zelenskyy said on social media.
“At least 160,000 Odesa residents are now without heat and electricity,” he said.
“We must remember that Russia is run by pathological liars and cannot be trusted – we must put pressure on them for the sake of peace.”
