More Trump shouts at Zelensky: "If Putin wants it, he'll destroy you."

LondonWithout television cameras as witnesses this time, but the last Friday's meeting at the White House between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky ended, more or less, like the one in February, with the US president shouting and "cursing constantly." This was stated on Monday by the Financial Times, from sources familiar with the meeting's ins and outs, in which Trump urged Zelensky to accept Russia's conditions for ending the war, warning him that Putin had told him he would "destroy" Ukraine if he didn't agree. In February, Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance publicly humiliated Zelensky, chiding him for his alleged lack of gratitude toward the United States and ultimately inviting him to leave at the end of what Trump called a "good television".

The meeting on Friday, to which Zelensky arrived with the intention of convincing Trump that he sold Tomahawk missiles to continue putting pressure on the Kremlin, had been scheduled after a few weeks in which the tycoon seemed to have changed his mind about the conflict and the fate of Ukraine. He had even commented on the very poor prospects for the Russian economy, and the carnage that the war was causing weekly among the ranks of the Kremlin military. But, crucially, the meeting with the Ukrainian president also took place twenty-four hours after Trump and Putin spoke on the phone and scheduled a new summit, in Budapest, for the next two weeksOnce again, the Republican changed his mind, according to the British newspaper.

"I've never been."

According to the sources mentioned in the Financial Times, the US president released maps of the front lines in Ukraine, insisted that Zelensky must cede the entire Donbas region to Putin, and repeatedly repeated the arguments the Russian leader had used in the aforementioned call the day before. One of the European insiders familiar with the White House discussions claims that Trump told Zelensky that Putin had explained to him that the conflict was a "special operation, not even a war," adding that the Ukrainian leader must make a deal or face destruction. "If [Putin] wants it, he'll destroy you."

"I don't even know where this red line is. I've never been there," Trump reportedly said, referring to the maps of the front lines in Ukraine, according to the official's account. Neither the White House nor the Ukrainian president's office immediately responded to requests for comment. Zelensky also made no reference to the matter in his latest daily statement, published on social media on Sunday evening, in which he stated only that "decisive steps are needed from the United States, Europe, and the G-20 and G-7 countries" to end the war. But on Monday, he admitted that the White House discussion was "frank" and suggested that Washington was making a mistake by accepting Hungary, Putin's closest European ally, as the host country for the meeting with the Russian president.

For his part, Trump told Fox News on Sunday that he was confident of ending the conflict, adding that Putin "will take something; he has gained some territory." Reports of the phone call between Trump and Putin indicate that Putin made a new proposal to Trump on Thursday, according to which Ukraine would cede the parts of the eastern Donbas region it still controls in exchange for small areas of the southern regions of Kherson and Zaporizhia. But ceding the rest of Donbas that is still under Ukrainian control is unthinkable for Ukraine, as it would hand over to Moscow a territory it has only partially occupied for more than a decade and has not been able to conquer since Putin ordered the invasion in 2022.

The EU

The information of the Financial Times has caught the European Union off guard. At the EU Foreign Affairs Council meeting, most EU ministers and leaders avoided directly criticizing the US president when asked about the meeting between Trump and Putin, but they did criticize the peace agreement that Trump wants the Ukrainian president to sign. Thus, although European Foreign Minister Kaja Kallas stated in statements to the media that the EU "sees President Trump's efforts to bring peace to Ukraine," she amended the plan that the White House wants Zelensky to accept, stating that Putin "doesn't really want peace" and that "he will only negotiate if he sees that he is negotiating." Gerard Fageda From Brussels.

The EU leader also demanded a seat for Zelensky at the potential meeting between Trump and Putin in Budapest. "It's them [Putin and Zelensky] who ultimately have to reach an agreement," Kallas noted. Along the same lines, the head of European diplomacy expressed skepticism about the success of the meeting in Hungary and criticized the request for Zelensky to give up part of Ukraine's territory. "It's negative that the aggressor gets what he wants; it sends a negative signal to all aggressors in the world," Kallas added, also asserting that there is currently a consensus among member states to defend Ukraine's territorial integrity and not cede any part of it to Russia.