The US President Donald Trump claimed that Russia holds the upper hand in negotiations to end the war in Ukraine.
“I think the Russians want to see the war end... But I think they have the cards a little bit, because they’ve taken a lot of territory, so they have the cards,” Trump told BBC reporters on Air Force One on Wednesday, Feb. 19.
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Trump has been steadily escalating his anti-Ukraine and pro-Kremlin rhetoric over the two days, since the US-Russia talks in Saudi Arabia.
On Tuesday, just several hours after the talks in Riyadh ended, Trump delivered a blow to Ukraine and a boost to Putin by claiming that President Volodymyr Zelensky has only a “4% approval rating” in the country and that presidential elections in Ukraine are necessary.
His comments echo Putin’s claims and are false. Zelensky’s rating as of early February stood at 57%, according to a survey released on Wednesday by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).
In a post on his Truth Social site on Wednesday, Trump further vilified Zelensky in his harshest critique to date, calling him a “modestly successful comedian” and a “dictator without elections.”
He blamed Zelensky for dragging the US into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, claimed that Washington spent $350 billion on Ukraine and criticized Europe’s contributions – claims that have been proved wildly inaccurate – before adding that Zelensky has “done a terrible job” for his country.
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