After his private discussion with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the NATO Summit on Wednesday, President Donald Trump didn’t dismiss the possibility of providing financial and defense support to Ukraine. He also expressed his displeasure with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
At a press conference concluding his visit to The Hague, Netherlands, Trump indicated a readiness to extend more assistance to Ukraine. He mentioned the potential to either sell or send Patriot air-defense missiles to bolster Ukraine’s defense capabilities against Russia.
“They are interested in acquiring the anti-missile systems known as the Patriots,” Trump stated about Ukraine’s defense needs. “We are considering how we can make some of these available to them.”
Trump’s openness comes as Zelenskyy told ABC News earlier this month the United States diverted anti-drone weapons, previously promised to Ukraine under a Biden administration agreement, to the Middle East.
“You know, they’re very hard to get. We need them to. We were supplying them to Israel, and they’re very effective, 100% effective. Hard to believe how effective,” Trump said.
“As far as money going, we’ll see what happens. There’s a lot of spirit,” Trump added.
Trump also appeared to shift his tone when describing his conversation with Zelenskyy, a relationship marked by many pivots.
“He was very nice, actually. You know, we had little rough times sometimes. He was uh – couldn’t have been nicer. I think he’d like to see an end to this. I do,” he said of Zelenskyy.
Zelenskyy offered similar praise of Trump, calling their meeting “long and substantive” while affirming he told him Ukraine is ready to buy more U.S. weapons.
“With the President, we discussed the protection of our people – first and foremost, the purchase of American air defense systems to cover our cities, our people, churches, and infrastructure,” Zelenskyy said in a statement on Wednesday.
“Ukraine is ready to buy this equipment and support American arms manufacturers. Europe can help as well,” Zelenskyy said. “We also talked about possible joint drone production. We can strengthen each other.”
During his press conference, Trump added Zelenskyy was fighting a “brave” and “tough” battle while putting pressure on Putin to show more willingness to end the conflict.
“Look. Vladimir Putin really has to end that war. People are dying at levels that people haven’t seen for a long time.”
Then, when pressed on why he wasn’t able to end the conflict between Russia and Ukraine quickly as he adamantly claimed while on the campaign trail, Trump again pointed the blame towards Putin.
“It’s more difficult than people wouldn’t have any idea,” Trump said.
“Vladimir Putin has been more difficult. Frankly, I had some problems with Zelenskyy. You may have read about him, and it’s been more difficult than other wars.”
Trump’s public praise of Zelenskyy marks a shift in tone for the President, who has had public battles with the leader of Ukraine.
Most notably in February, a public Oval Office spat between the two officials led to a scrapped bilateral mineral deal, which wasn’t finalized for two months until the pair sat down together on the sidelines of Pope Francis’ funeral.
Then, in recent weeks, as Trump focused on negotiating an agreement between Iran and Israel, he left last week’s G7 Summit in Canada early, skipping out on a bilateral with Ukraine.
However, after their meeting on Wednesday, Trump displayed more compassion for the situation in Ukraine in a moment highlighted by his exchange with a Ukrainian reporter who said her husband was a Ukrainian soldier while she and her children fled to Warsaw for safety.
“Wow, that’s rough stuff, right? That’s tough,” Trump said, asking the reporter many personal questions before answering her policy question.
“That’s very good question. And I wish you a lot of luck. I mean, I can see it’s very upsetting to you. So say hello to your husband. Okay?” Trump said.
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