Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Friday he would work with both Ukraine and Russia to end their war, as he stood next to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy before their meeting in New York.
Speaking to reporters at Trump Tower, Zelenskiy said he wanted to discuss his “victory plan” for Ukraine with Trump during their first meeting since 2019. He said he was meeting both Trump and his Democratic rival in the Nov. 5 election, Vice President Kamala Harris, because Ukraine needed strong US support in its continuing war with Russia.
Trump praised Zelenskiy, but said he also had a solid relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“We have a very good relationship (with Zelenskiy), and I also have a very good relationship, as you know, with President Putin,” Trump said. “And I think if we win, I think we’re going to get it resolved very quickly,” he added.
Zelenskiy and Trump stood alongside one another, with the Ukrainian president occasionally looking up at Trump during the latter’s remarks to journalists.
Zelenskiy has used his US visit to promote his “victory plan,” which a U.S. official described as a repackaged request for more weapons and a lifting of restrictions on the use of long-range missiles. The plan presupposes the ultimate defeat of Russia in the war, the official said. Some officials see the aim as unrealistic.
When asked on Thursday by a reporter if Ukraine should hand over some land to Russia to end the war – a non-starter for Kyiv – Trump replied: “We’ll see what happens.”
Still, Trump said on Friday he was pleased to meet with Zelenskiy, a marked change in tone from some of his previous comments on the campaign trail.
On Monday, Trump said Zelenskiy wanted Harris to win the election. He has also called Zelenskiy “the greatest salesman of all time” because his country has received billions of dollars in military aid from the United States and Europe.
“It’s an honor to have the president with us, and he’s been through a lot,” Trump said on Friday. “He’s been through a tremendous amount, like probably nobody else, almost nobody else in history, if you really get right down to it, and we’re going to have a discussion and see what we could come up with.”
Trump said that if he won the Nov. 5 election he would immediately begin working toward a resolution of the Ukraine conflict, even though he would formally take office only in late January 2025.
Zelenskiy, who is in the United States for the U.N. General Assembly, met on Thursday with Democratic President Joe Biden and Harris.
Over the weekend, Zelenskiy traveled to a munitions factory in Pennsylvania with that state’s Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro, a Harris ally. The visit upset Trump’s campaign and enraged some congressional Republicans who viewed the trip as a campaign stop, particularly as Pennsylvania is an important battleground state expected to decide the U.S. election.
As late as Thursday, people close to Trump and his campaign had said a meeting appeared extremely unlikely, though the former president apparently changed his mind during Zelenskiy’s stay in the country.
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