The Kremlin has said it ‘absolutely’ agrees with Donald Trump after the US president warned Volodymyr Zelensky to ‘move fast’ to end the conflict in Ukraine – as Europe has been left panicked at the prospect of Washington abandoning Kyiv.
‘[The Trump administration] talk about the need to establish peace as soon as possible and do it through negotiations,’ Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists.
‘We have also already mentioned that this position is more favourable to us than the previous administration, and that here we absolutely agree with the American administration.’
Peskov went on to hit out at the Biden administration, claiming that the previous team in Washington ‘did not declare any goals to initiate a peace process’ and spoke ‘only about war.’
He also declared that any plan to send European troops to Ukraine as part of a potential peacekeeping mission would be unacceptable for Russia and that it was monitoring such proposals with concern.
Moscow is likely feeling emboldened following Trump’s scathing attacks on Zelensky yesterday, in which he called the Ukrainian President a ‘terrible’ leader, ‘a modestly successful comedian’ and ‘a dictator without elections’.
In what appeared to be a thinly-veiled threat, and a shocking departure from US policy on Ukraine, the President went on to say that ‘Zelensky better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left.’
The extraordinary outburst came after Zelensky accused the US President of falling for Russian fake news, with Trump suggesting yesterday that Ukraine was to blame for Moscow’s illegal invasion of the country three years ago.
Trump, pictured arriving at the White House last night, yesterday launched an eviscerating attack on President Zelensky
Vladimir Putin earlier praised Trump for ‘changing his position’ when he ‘began to receive objective information’
Zelensky has blasted the United States for ‘helping’ Vladimir Putin ‘to come out of isolation’
Speaking today, Peskov reiterated that relations between the US and Russia were on the path to improving and revealed that Moscow had agreed to resume dialogue with Washington on all issues regarding the war in Ukraine.
‘It was decided to start resuming Russian-American dialogue on all parameters,’ he said, after the two sides held talks in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday.
A possible new prisoner exchange between Russia and the US was on the agenda, he added, as part of Moscow and Washington’s agreement to start work on restoring relations at all levels.
As relations between Washington and Kyiv deteriorate, US envoy Keith Kellogg will meet Zelensky for talks in Ukraine.
Arriving in the capital yesterday, Kellogg said he understood ‘the need for security guarantees,’ adding that part of his mission would be ‘to sit and listen.’
Zelensky responded by saying that it was important that today’s meeting and work with America in general is ‘constructive’.
He has said Tuesday’s talks between US and Russian officials came as a ‘surprise’ to Kyiv, amid fears that Ukraine is being frozen out of negotiations which could result in it being forced by Washington to accept an unfavourable peace deal.
Referring to the talks, Zelensky said yesterday: ‘I believe that the United States helped Putin to break out of years of isolation… All of this has no positive impact on Ukraine.’
Speaking on Wednesday, Putin said that Trump had told him that Ukraine will take part in future talks, adding that there was no need for a ‘hysterical’ reaction to yesterday’s meeting.
‘We are not imposing anything on anyone. We are ready, I have already said this a hundred times – if they want, please, let these negotiations take place. And we will be ready to return to the table for negotiations,’ he said. ‘No one is excluding Ukraine.’
The US and Russian delegations pictured attending the bilateral meeting in Riyadh on Tuesday
But Russia appears to have already laid out its conditions both with the US and in the public forum – before Kyiv has even met with Moscow officials.
The Kremlin has repeatedly said it opposes having NATO troops on the ground in Ukraine, with foreign minister Sergei Lavrov saying this week that Moscow would view that as a ‘direct threat’ to Russia’s sovereignty, even if the troops operated there under a different flag.
He yesterday praised Trump for ‘publicly and loudly’ blaming the conflict on moves to admit Kyiv into the NATO military alliance, saying ‘he is the first… and only Western leader’ to do so.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has said he is ‘ready and willing’ to put UK troops on the ground in Ukraine, with US backing, as a security guarantee in the event of some sort of a ceasefire deal between Moscow and Kyiv.
Starmer is planning to present a plan to Trump to send fewer than 30,000 European servicemen to Ukraine in exchange for American protection of the troops, the Telegraph newspaper reported.
Peskov said the reported proposal was unacceptable because it would involve forces from a NATO member state and therefore have ramifications for Russia’s own security.
‘This causes concern for us, because we’re talking about sending military contingents – about the possible, eventual sending of military contingents from NATO countries to Ukraine,’ Peskov told reporters in a daily briefing.
‘This takes on a completely different meaning from the point of view of our security’, he said. ‘We’re monitoring this very closely.’
President Zelensky (R) and his wife Olena Zelenska pay tribute to the ‘Heavenly Hundred Heroes’ in central Kyiv, in memory of the fallen participants of the Maidan protests
Asked by reporters about the possibility of a new prisoner swap, Peskov said today that US-Russia talks in Riyadh had contributed to a general rapprochement between the two superpowers.
At least 10 Americans remain behind bars in Russia, including two who have been designated as ‘wrongfully detained’ by Washington.
Moscow freed an American citizen, Kalob Byers, days before the Russian and American delegations met in the Saudi capital.
Earlier this month, Russia freed Marc Fogel, a U.S. schoolteacher who had been serving a 14-year sentence for drug smuggling after being caught at a Moscow airport with a small amount of marijuana.
He was freed in exchange for Alexander Vinnik, a Russian cybercrime boss who had pleaded guilty to money laundering, after being extradited from Greece.
The swap came on the heels of a much larger prisoner exchange last August, involving the United States, Germany, Norway, Slovenia, Russia and Belarus.
Among those freed at that time was Evan Gershkovich, a Wall Street Journal reporter who had been jailed in Russia on espionage charges that he, the newspaper and the US government denied.
