Even before he arrived in the United States, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s trip has been overshadowed by an announcement by US President Donald Trump that he had agreed to another summit with Vladimir Putin.
Zelenskyy had been hoping to secure US weapons that would allow Ukrainian forces to strike deep into Russian territory, hitting key targets.
Zelenskyy has argued such strikes would help compel Putin to take Trump’s calls for direct negotiations to end the war more seriously.
He had hoped to secure that could strike deep into Russia.
“We can already see that Moscow is rushing to resume dialogue as soon as it hears about Tomahawks,” he said.
But Trump appears set on pursuing a new diplomatic breakthrough.
On his Truth Social network, he said he made progress during his phone call with Putin, saying their meeting in Hungary would aim to “bring this ‘inglorious’ War, between Russia and Ukraine, to an end.”
Speaking about sending Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, Trump said Putin “didn’t like it” when he brought it up during their call.
Trump added the US couldn’t afford to “deplete” its own stockpile.
“We need them too, so I don’t know what we can do about that,” he said.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said talk of providing Tomahawks had already served a purpose by pushing Putin into talks.
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