{"id":32561,"date":"2025-06-25T16:35:23","date_gmt":"2025-06-25T16:35:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=32561"},"modified":"2025-06-25T16:35:23","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T16:35:23","slug":"trump-changes-tune-on-zelenskyy-and-putin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=32561","title":{"rendered":"Trump changes tune on Zelenskyy and Putin"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> \n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__content-sign-up-topic-description o3-type-body-base\">Your guide to what Trump\u2019s second term means for Washington, business and the world<\/p>\n<p><iframe class=\"article__content-sign-up-iframe close\" scrolling=\"no\" id=\"signUpIframe\" data-prev-url=\"\/register\/in-article-sign-up?ft-content-uuid=59713110-f652-4312-aa83-783b86274c44&amp;newsletter-id=65b8fec772badb00166eafc6\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div id=\"article-body\">\n<p>Donald Trump has shown sympathy towards Ukraine\u2019s Volodymyr Zelenskyy, describing him as \u201cvery nice\u201d after meeting him on the sidelines of the Nato summit, while striking a tougher tone on Russia.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cVladimir Putin really has to end that war. People are dying at levels and people haven\u2019t seen before for a long time,\u201d Trump said. He added that the Russian leader had offered to mediate in the Iran-Israel conflict, to which he responded: \u201cNo, you can help me with Russia.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The US president has oscillated in his attitudes towards his Russian and Ukrainian counterparts, culminating with an Oval Office bust-up with Zelenskyy in February after which Washington temporarily suspended its military and intelligence assistance to Kyiv. <\/p>\n<p>By contrast, Trump initially appeared to be more understanding of Putin, whom he called several times and with whose negotiating team the US engaged in direct peace talks. But in recent weeks, Trump has grown increasingly frustrated with the Russian president over his maximalist demands and refusal to agree to a ceasefire.<\/p>\n<p>During the Nato summit discussions, Trump expressed frustration about the situation in Ukraine, which he said was \u201cgetting out of control\u201d, according to two people in the room. <\/p>\n<p>Zelenskyy described his meeting with Trump as \u201clong and substantive\u200b\u201d \u2014 their second face-to-face meeting since February. They discussed \u201call the truly important issues\u200b\u201d, the Ukrainian leader said, including \u201chow to protect our people\u201d and \u201chow to achieve a ceasefire and a real peace\u201d. <\/p>\n<p>Trump disputed that they had discussed a ceasefire but still described the nearly hour-long meeting as \u201cvery nice\u201d and focused on Ukraine\u2019s overall situation.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNo, no, I wanted to know how he\u2019s doing. He was very nice, actually,\u201d Trump said. \u201cHe\u2019s fighting a tough battle. It\u2019s a tough battle.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Trump said he and Zelenskyy had \u201chad rough times\u201d in the past, an apparent reference to the White House row. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat I took from the meeting \u2014 couldn\u2019t have been nicer actually \u2014 but I took from the meeting that he\u2019d like to see it end,\u201d Trump said of Zelenskyy. \u201cI think it\u2019s a great time to end it. I\u2019m going to speak to Vladimir Putin and see if we can end it,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n<p>Trump said that \u201cthe Ukraine crisis has also highlighted the urgency of rebuilding our defence industrial base\u201d and that neither the US nor its allies could \u201cafford to be dependent on foreign adversaries for critical minerals\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Kyiv and Washington signed a minerals deal last month, after an initial agreement that Zelenskyy was supposed to have signed in Washington was abandoned due to the Oval Office row.<\/p>\n<p>Trump and Zelenskyy met again in April, when they spoke one-on-one at St Peter\u2019s Basilica during Pope Francis\u2019 funeral. They were expected to have a meeting at the G7 summit last week but the US president left early. <\/p>\n<p>Their meeting on Wednesday came as Russia accelerates its summer offensive and production of missiles and drones.<\/p>\n<p>Konrad Muzyka, director of Rochan Consulting, a Poland-based group that tracks the war, said Russia had launched more Shahed drones this spring than at any time during the war. \u201cIn June, they have already launched 4,342, and if the current tempo is maintained, the total may exceed 5,000 by the end of the month,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Russia\u2019s air campaign has accompanied a brutal new ground offensive that has seen its troops advance at their fastest pace since November. Several key cities in eastern Ukraine are now in their crosshairs, including the logistical hubs of Pokrovsk and Kostyantynivka, which have all but become ghost towns due to relentless Russian bombing.<\/p>\n<p>Trump claimed that the Ukrainian and Russian armies had suffered a combined 7,000 casualties on the battlefield last week. <\/p>\n<p>That figure could not be independently verified.<\/p>\n<p>With his military on the back foot and facing a shortage of American-supplied arms and ammunition \u2014 US funding for military aid that was approved under former president Joe Biden will probably run out this summer \u2014 Zelenskyy has pleaded with Trump to sell Ukraine more weapons. <\/p>\n<p>Atop his wish list are more US-made Patriot air defence systems and interceptor missiles to protect the skies over his war-torn nation.<\/p>\n<p>Trump said Washington was looking into making more Patriot missiles available to Ukraine, though the US and Israel needed them as well. <\/p>\n<p><em>Additional reporting by Anne-Sylvaine Chassany and Henry Foy in The Hague<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/59713110-f652-4312-aa83-783b86274c44\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what Trump\u2019s second term means for Washington,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":32562,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-us","cs-entry","cs-video-wrap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=32561"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32561\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/32562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=32561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=32561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=32561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}