Donald Trump meets with NASA's Artemis II astronauts in the Oval Office of the White House.Donald Trump has once again sided with Vladimir Putin over the Ukraine war – and appeared to take another sly dig at Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
The US president insisted Russia’s leader “was ready to make a deal a while ago” to end the conflict.
But in an apparent reference to Zelenskyy, he claimed “some people made it difficult for him”.
His comments, in the Oval Office on Wednesday, came as the deadlock in the war continues more than four years after Putin started it by ordering his troops to invade Uklraine.
Repeated attempts by Trump to end the conflict have failed after Ukraine rejected Russian demands to hand over territory which they have failed to take by force.
Speaking about his most recent phone conversation with the Russian president, Trump said: “I said before you help me I want to end your war. We had a good talk, I’ve known him a long time.
“I think he was ready to make a deal a while ago. I think some people made it difficult for him to make a deal.”
Trump says he had a “good talk” with war criminal Vladimir Putin, who he claims wants to end the war:
“He was ready to make a deal a while ago but some people made it difficult for him to make a deal.”
By “some people,” Trump likely refers to President Zelenskyy, who refused to… pic.twitter.com/NVfx1o9OrA
Trump has regularly repeated Kremlin talking points about the war since being re-elected president in 2024.
Most notably, he has claimed that Ukraine, rather than Russia, actually started the conflict.
Speaking last year, the president said: “Russia is a powerful military nation.
“You know, whether people like it or not, it’s a powerful nation. It’s a much bigger nation. You don’t do that. You don’t take on a nation that’s 10 times your size.”
He also said Ukraine provoked the war by trying to get too close to Nato and the West.
“It was always a no-no, you could not. Russia said, ‘We don’t want the so-called opponent or the enemy,’ let’s use that term, ‘We don’t want them on our border.’ And they were right.”
Subscribe to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.
Bengali (Bangladesh) · 
English (United States) ·