3 months ago
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Donald Trump has accused Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky of prolonging the ‘killing field’ by refusing to hand Russia land.
The White House has demanded that Kyiv give up territory as part of a long-sought peace deal to end the three-year war with Russia.
Moscow has captured about 20% of Ukraine, including Crimea, which it seized in 2014. Some 4.6million Ukrainians have fled their homes in the occupied territories and Crimea.
But Zelensky said today, ahead of talks in London among US, European and Ukrainian officials, that ceding territory is out of the question.
‘There is nothing to talk about. It is our land, the land of the Ukrainian people,’ Zelensky said.
His comment came after American media reports said Trump administration was ready to accept recognition of the annexed land in Crimea.
In a post on his Truth Social network, Trump accused the Ukrainian leader of ‘inflammatory’ comments that he claimed would drag the war out.
‘If he wants Crimea, why didn’t they fight for it eleven years ago when it was handed over to Russia without a shot being fired?’ Trump wrote in the 260-word-long rant.
‘The statement made by Zelensky today will do nothing but prolong the “killing field,” and nobody wants that!’
He added: ‘Its inflammatory statements like Zelenskyy’s that makes it so difficult to settle this War.
‘He has nothing to boast about! The situation for Ukraine is dire — He can have Peace or he can fight for another three years before losing the whole Country.’
Russia annexed Crimea, a peninsula in Eastern Europe, practically overnight in 2014.
Vladimir Putin redrew the Crimean border that had been recognised as part of an independent Ukraine for 23 years by sending troops to overrun it.
So to accept Crimea as Russian land would be to ‘violate’ Ukraine’s constitution, Zelensky said.
Yulia Svyrydenko, the Ukrainian economy minister, agreed.
Writing on X, she said: ‘Ukraine is ready to negotiate — but not to surrender. There will be no agreement that hands Russia the stronger foundations it needs to regroup and return with greater violence.
Vice President JD Vance called on Ukraine to accept the American peace deal today, one that closely aligns with Putin’s wants.
Putin has long said that he would sign a peace agreement in which Ukraine withdraws troops from the four provinces he abruptly annexed in 2022.
The deal says that Ukraine and Russia would ‘freeze’ territorial lines, leaving Russian forces deep inside occupied eastern Ukraine. It would also stop Ukraine from joining NATO.
‘We’ve issued a very explicit proposal to both the Russians and the Ukrainians, and it’s time for them to either say yes or for the United States to walk away from this process,’ US Vice President JD Vance told reporters in India today.
‘The only way to really stop the killing is for the armies to both put down their weapons, to freeze this thing and to get on with the business of actually building a better Russia and a better Ukraine.’
Lower-level diplomats from the UK, France, Germany, Ukraine and the US gathered for peace talks led by Foreign Secretary David Lammy.
‘We are working at pace with US, Ukraine and European allies to end the war and secure a just and lasting peace, with senior official talks in London today,’ Lammy said.
As officials met in the English capital to chat, the lives of ordinary people in war-torn Ukraine and Russia continued.
Nine Ukrainians were killed and 54 injured after a Russian drone hit a bus transporting workers in the eastern city of Marhanets this morning.
Zelensky said the attack was a ‘deliberate war crime’ on an ‘ordinary bus… clearly a civilian target’.
In Moscow, three explosions rocked the city’s central business district just 15 minutes from the Kremlin this afternoon.
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