After three years of fighting Russia, Volodymyr Zelenskyy leads Ukraine into a fourth year of conflict with a new battle on his hands: fending off Donald Trump’s demand that he agree a peace deal “fast or he’s not going to have a country left”.
The Ukrainian president has said he will not accept the results of Russian-US talks “held behind Ukraine’s back”, nor agree to Trump’s $500 billion (£395 billion) “payback” plan to give the US rights to Ukrainian minerals in return for military assistance. But the US president “appears determined not only to end the war on Putin’s terms but to take down” Zelenskyy’s government, said The New Statesman.
Other world leaders are, for the time being, standing firm with Kyiv. Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau are among the politicians visiting the Ukrainian capital today to mark the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion. And both Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron have signalled they’ll be backing Zelenskyy when they meet Trump this week.
What did the commentators say?
Trump’s actions seem to be giving Vladimir Putin a victory “he could not possibly have dreamed of even a week ago”, wrote Owen Matthews in The Spectator. Not only is the US president endorsing all Moscow’s messages around the war, he has also signalled that “he regards Zelenskyy as a dictator”.
But Putin should pay heed to Trump’s past form, said Lawrence Freedman, an emeritus professor of war studies at King’s College London, in The New Statesman. During his first term in office, Trump was “even more gushing” about North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, only to cool off suddenly when “reality set in”. It’s “as likely as not” that “there will be no early deal”.
Regardless, “the shift in Washington’s policy has set off alarm bells in Europe”, said The Associated Press. The visits to Ukraine today are part of a “conspicuous show of support” for Zelenskyy – “We are in Kyiv today because Ukraine is Europe”, posted von der Leyen on X. The EU has also announced that it is “committed to supporting Ukraine” until there is “a just and lasting peace”.
In Ukraine itself, 91% oppose any peace negotiations that exclude their country, according to a survey in The Kyiv Independent. In a weekend call with Zelenskyy, Starmer affirmed that Ukraine must be “at the heart of any negotiations” on a peace deal, and that “safeguarding Ukraine’s sovereignty was essential” to stop future Russian aggression, said The Guardian.
What happens next?
Starmer and Macron will deliver a united message on Ukraine at their respective meetings with Trump this week, pursuing a co-ordinated approach agreed after “a round of intense international diplomacy”, said The Times. The two leaders will each try to persuade Trump “not to hold bilateral peace negotiations with Moscow, in return for European commitments to Ukraine’s future security”.