There is nothing personal between Volodymyr Zelensky and Donald Trump, the Ukrainian president said in an interview with CNN. However, he warned that any rapprochement with Vladimir Putin and the lifting of sanctions against Russia will strengthen the Russian president.
“I think that if we lift the sanctions, we will make him stronger. This is not something personal between me and President Trump“, Zelensky said. According to him, Putin has no intention of ending the war, and the pressure on Moscow should not be weakened.
Tensions between Washington and Kiev
Relations between the United States and Ukraine have deteriorated in recent weeks. Zelensky said Trump was "on the wrong side of history" after the US president announced a deal to buy Russian fuel and supported lifting some sanctions against Moscow.
In parallel, Ukrainian forces' access to Starshield - SpaceX's military communications service - was restricted. Zelensky said that intelligence sharing with the US had been restored, but Starshield was not yet fully operational.
War cessation talks
US special envoy Steve Witkoff spoke for three hours with Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg on October 21. The meeting followed his talks with Zelensky in Oslo. According to News.bg, Witkoff described Putin as a "humanist" over the release of 74-year-old American prisoner Stephen Hubbard.
Trump said that if sanctions against Russia are tightened, Hubbard could remain in prison, and defended his approach with the argument: “When you are close to a deal and are conducting delicate negotiations, you do not impose sanctions“.
Zelensky described the Oslo meeting as fruitful, but said he was not convinced of Putin's readiness for peace. “Putin is playing, you understand, he is a player“, the Ukrainian president said. According to him, the Russian leader is playing with other people's lives and does not want to stop the war.
Territories remain the main dispute
Zelensky allowed the current front lines to be frozen if this led to a ceasefire and the resumption of talks. However, he rejected the possibility that Ukraine would cede territories it currently controls or recognize temporarily occupied areas as part of Russia.
“Our land is very important, because it is about people. It is not about kilometers“, Zelensky said. He added that no one will recognize the occupied territories as Russian.
Kiev wants sanctions and missiles
The Ukrainian president said that his country continues to experience a critical shortage of interceptor missiles. Even when warned of a Russian ballistic missile, the Ukrainian military does not always have the means to shoot it down.
According to Zelensky, European allies have provided air defense missiles, but the quantities are not sufficient. "Not to lift sanctions against Putin and to provide us with better missiles," he said, as the two main needs of Ukraine from its partners.
Sources: news.bg