Trump: Ukraine Is “More Difficult” to Deal With Than Russia

Trump has claimed that compared to Russia, negotiating with Ukraine is “more difficult.”

Brokering peace between Russia and Ukraine has been “more difficult, frankly, to deal with Ukraine” than Moscow, according to US President Donald Trump. Trump said the United States is “doing very well with Russia” and that “it may be easier dealing with” Moscow than Kyiv in an interview with reporters in the Oval Office on Friday.

In order to secure a ceasefire with Ukraine, Trump has stated that he was “strongly considering” enacting significant penalties and tariffs on Russia. Space technology company Maxar told BBC Verify that the US later took actions that indicated a change in its position on Ukraine, temporarily cutting off the nation’s access to some satellite imagery. Trump’s prior decision to halt military aid to Kyiv was followed by this decision.

Trump chastised Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for being “disrespectful” to the United States during a contentious White House debate one week prior to the current events. A few days afterward, the United States halted all military aid and intelligence exchange with Ukraine.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s energy infrastructure was the target of a massive missile and drone attack by Russia on Thursday night. In response, Trump said he was thinking about imposing further tariffs since “Russia is absolutely ‘pounding’ Ukraine on the battlefield right now” and vowed to extend sanctions against Moscow.

With the statement, “I think he’s hitting them [Ukraine] harder than he’s been hitting them,” Trump seemed to defend Russian President Vladimir Putin’s actions in spite of this. Furthermore, I believe that someone in that role would be doing that at this very moment. Even if he thinks Putin wants to stop the war, he expressed doubts about Ukraine’s desire to engage in negotiations, he added. He said, “I want to know they [Ukraine] want to settle, and I don’t know they want to settle,” in response to a query concerning the decision to stop aid into Kyiv.

Concerned about Trump’s direct interaction with Putin, NATO members have mostly shunned direct discussions with Moscow since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. After military and intelligence assistance was suspended, Trump’s foreign policy team lately took a more accommodative stance toward Ukraine, notwithstanding his combative interactions with Zelensky.

Washington is pressuring Zelensky to approve a deal that would give the US a large share of Ukrainian minerals and bind Kyiv to a quick ceasefire with Moscow, according to sources. On the other hand, Zelensky has been pushing for strong security assurances in every agreement. Trump said in his Friday remarks that security guarantees were the “easy part” and could be solved later.

A further complicating factor is the denial of Ukraine’s access to US satellite imagery. The US government has “decided to temporarily suspend Ukrainian accounts in GEGD,” a program that offers high-quality satellite imagery gathered by the US government, according to confirmation from space technology company Maxar to BBC Verify. In line with the administration’s instructions on help to Ukraine, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which is part of the US Department of Defense, recognized the suspension.

Zelensky’s team will meet with Trump’s top officials in Saudi Arabia next week amid mounting pressure on Ukraine to agree to US suggestions. In an optimistic statement, Zelensky said he thinks the forthcoming talks would be “meaningful.” Ukraine is “ready for peace as soon as possible,” he reaffirmed on Friday, adding that it has taken “concrete steps” to bring about peace. “New Russian strikes every day and reality itself demonstrate that Russia is the one who needs to be compelled to make peace,” he said.

In an attempt to repair relations after his public altercation with Trump, Zelensky has subsequently apologized for the incident. Steve Witkoff, the US special envoy, disclosed Thursday that Zelensky had written to Trump with a “apology” and “sense of gratitude.” “Hopefully, we make progress with the Ukrainians and everything gets back to normal,” Witkoff continued.

In the meantime, as European governments push for far higher defense spending, the UK has stated that some 20 nations are interested in forming a “coalition of the willing” to offer Ukraine more military support.

At least five people were killed by Russian troops in the Donetsk area of Ukraine on Friday, according to local authorities, as violence raged on the battlefield.