Russia-Ukraine Conflict: Trump Urges Zelenskyy and Putin to “Reach an Agreement” | World News
Former President Donald Trump has stated that Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy need to “make a deal” to put an end to the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
The US president-elect emphasized that the war “has to stop” and lamented that people are “dying at levels nobody has ever seen before.”
He further expressed that it might take “100 years” to reconstruct Ukrainian cities devastated by the Russian invasion, a situation he insisted “should not” and “would not” have occurred had he been in office.
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His comments come after President Putin claimed in a recent speech that the conflict is shifting in favor of Russia after nearly three years of intense combat, which has seen Russia seize large portions of eastern Ukraine.
President Zelenskyy has been consistently against any peace agreement that would allow Russia to maintain control over Ukrainian territory, including Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014.
However, in a recent exclusive interview with Sky News, he suggested that a ceasefire could be negotiated if the territories he governs could fall “under the NATO umbrella,” enabling him to later seek the return of other lands “in a diplomatic manner.”
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Vladimir Putin at a meeting at the national defense control centre in Moscow. Pic: Sputnik/Reuters
‘It’s got to stop’
Mr. Trump recently secured a second term as president, campaigning on the claim that he could resolve the Russia-Ukraine conflict in as little as “one day.”
At a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago home in Florida, he reiterated his commitment to ending the war.
“Gotta make a deal,” Mr. Trump stated, expressing his intention to engage with both Mr. Putin and Mr. Zelenskyy in discussions to end the hostilities in Ukraine.
He recounted being shown heartbreaking images of battlefields filled with casualties, comparing them to some of the grim photographs from the American Civil War. “It’s got to stop,” he remarked.
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Zelenskyy on how ceasefire could work
Mr. Trump refrained from providing a clear response when asked if he thought Ukraine should concede territory to Russia as part of any negotiated settlement aimed at ending the conflict.
‘A turning point’
Earlier, President Putin addressed a military conference where he suggested that the significant number of men voluntarily enrolling in the military indicated that the course of the Ukraine war was shifting in Russia’s favor.
“I would like to highlight that the past year marked a milestone in achieving the objectives of the special military operation [in Ukraine],” Mr. Putin stated to senior military officials in Moscow.
“Russian forces have a solid grip on the strategic initiative across the entire line of contact,” he noted.
According to Russia’s defense ministry, around 427,000 soldiers signed military contracts this year, up from approximately 300,000 the previous year.
Commenting on this statistic, Mr. Putin remarked: “This influx of volunteers shows no signs of ending. And because of this… we are witnessing a turning point on the front lines.”
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In recent months, Russia has been making minor territorial gains in Ukraine, though reportedly at a significant human cost.
However, open-source maps indicate that Russian troops are now advancing at the fastest rate since the initial stages of their invasion in 2022.
