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      ‘A bigger victory for Putin than any military battle’: Russia gleeful after Trump-Zelenskyy clash

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      Russian officials and Moscow’s media outlets reacted with predictable glee to the dramatic clash between Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump at the White House on Friday.Posting on social media, Dmitry Medvedev, Putin’s deputy on the security council and former president, called the exchange “a brutal dressing-down in the Oval Office”.He wrote: “Trump told the … clown [Zelenskyy] the truth to his face: the Kyiv regime is playing with the third world war … This is useful. But it’s not enough – we need to stop military support [to Ukraine].”In recent days, concern grew in Moscow as Trump seemed to lean toward a more Zelenskyy-friendly position following visits to Washington by the leaders of Poland, France and Britain, who urged support for Ukraine. Trump had indicated a willingness to back European peacekeepers in Ukraine – a move Kyiv and European governments saw as essential to preventing Moscow from reigniting the war, as it had after previous ceasefires.But any worries the Kremlin may have had faded when Zelenskyy found himself ambushed by Trump and his vice-president, JD Vance.“How Trump and Vance held back from hitting that scumbag is a miracle of restraint,” wrote Maria Zakharova, Russia’s foreign ministry spokesperson, on Telegram.There has been no comment so far from Putin, who has instead taken a backseat, likely watching the fallout unfold with satisfaction. “Putin doesn’t have to say much right now,” said a source familiar with the Kremlin’s thinking.“It’s clear that he enjoyed the show and now believes he can push for even greater demands in Ukraine. That meeting was a bigger victory for Putin than any of his military battles since the start of the war.”The source predicted that Putin is likely to call Trump in the coming days to argue that Zelenskyy is not someone who can be reasoned with and must be replaced – a sentiment already echoed by some in Moscow as well as Washington.“The White House will now start looking more closely at other candidates for Ukraine’s presidency,” wrote Alexey Pushkov, a member of the upper house of the Russian parliament, on Telegram.View image in fullscreenRegime change in Ukraine has long been a goal for Putin, who has never hidden his desire to install a new leadership in Kyiv which is friendly to Moscow. On Telegram – the primary platform for political discourse in Russia – many influential pro-war bloggers echoed the rhetoric of Trump’s inner circle that portrayed Zelenskyy as an ungrateful child.“Overall, the meeting in the Oval Office once again revealed the true face of Zelenskyy: ungrateful, arrogant, brazen, and boundless,” wrote Rybar, a popular account with links to the Russian defence ministry.For Kremlin insiders, the incident also signified a fundamental shift in the global order, with a White House no longer seen as an enemy but rather as a partner to Moscow – one with whom business and politics can be conducted.“Volodymyr Zelenskyy underestimated the scale of the shift that took place in American politics after Donald Trump’s arrival,” said Fyodor Lukyanov, a prominent Russian foreign-policy analyst who heads a council that advises the Kremlin.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionLukyanov highlighted Friday’s moment when Trump declared that he was not on Ukraine’s side but viewed himself as a mediator in the conflict. “This is a fundamental shift,” Lukyanov added.But there were also warnings in Moscow that, given Trump’s unpredictable nature, it was too early to declare victory.“In the short term, this tragicomic exchange will undoubtedly weaken Zelenskyy’s position within Ukraine and give Russian diplomacy additional leverage in its dealings with the US,” said Anton Grishanov, a researcher at a thinktank affiliated with Russia’s foreign ministry.“That said, Moscow and Washington still have divergent views on the settlement process, and Trump’s unpredictable temperament could bring plenty of surprises on the path to ending the conflict,” he added.As the dust settles, it’s clear that Friday’s meeting delivered a major blow to Trump’s efforts to negotiate a peace deal between Kyiv and Moscow, while Russia prepares to escalate its offensive against a Ukraine on the verge of losing its most vital military support.“The war continues,” Lukyanov concluded. More

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      Bullying, berating Trump shows his worst self in Zelenskyy ambush

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      “This is going to be great television,” Donald Trump remarked at the end. Sure. And the captain of the Titanic probably assured his passengers that this would make a great movie some day.Trump has just presided over one of the greatest diplomatic disasters in modern history. Tempers flared, voices were raised and protocol was shredded in the once hallowed in the Oval Office. As Trump got into a shouting match Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a horrified Europe watched the post-second world war order crumble before its eyes.Never before has a US president bullied and berated an adversary, never mind an ally, in such a public way. Of course reality TV star and wrestling fan turned US president had it all play out on television for the benefit of his populist support base – and a certain bare-chested chum in the Kremlin.Zelenskyy had come to the White House to sign a deal for US involvement in Ukraine’s mineral industry to pave the way for an end to three-year war in Russia. There was a hint of trouble to come when he arrived at the West Wing, wearing black – not a suit – and Trump greeted him with a handshake and sarcasm: “Wow, look, you’re all dressed up!”Inside the Oval Office, which has seen much but never anything quite like this, Zelenskyy thanked Trump for the invitation. At first all was sweetness and light as they fielded questions from reporters.There was a minor wrinkle over how much Europe support has given Ukraine, which ended with smiles, a playful but pointed tap on Zelenskyy, and ominous words from Trump: “Don’t argue with me.”But the last 10 minutes of the nearly 45-minute meeting devolved into acrimony and chaos. Zelenskyy found himself ambushed by Trump and his serpentine vice-president, JD Vance. He was expected to sit back and take a beating from Nurse Ratched and Miss Trunchbull. He refused.Vance said Joe Biden’s approach had failed and that diplomacy was the way forward. Zelenskyy challenged “JD” on this, noting Russia’s betrayals of trust in the past.Vance, who once declared he doesn’t care what happens in Ukraine, was riled. Finger jabbing, he told Zelenskyy: “Mr President, with respect. I think it’s disrespectful for you to come to the Oval Office to try to litigate this in front of the American media.”Uh-oh. The politicians and journalists in the room could surely tell this was going off the rails. At one point the Ukrainian ambassador would put her head in her hands. She was all of us.Zelenskyy tried to push back, asking if Vance had ever been to Ukraine. Vance got angry and spoke of “propaganda tours”. Zelenskyy tried to answer but Trump interjected: “Don’t tell us what we’re going to feel.”The men spoke over each other. Raising his voice, the president said: “You don’t have the cards right now.”Zelenskyy responded: “I’m not playing cards.”Trump, pointing an accusing finger and descending into his worst self from the presidential debates, admonished: “You’re gambling with the lives of millions of people. You’re gambling with world war three and what you’re doing is very disrespectful to the country, this country that’s backed you far more than a lot of people say they should have.”TV pro tip: Trump has spent so many campaign rallies warning about world war three that the phrase has lost its shock value.Trump and Vance tried to scold Zelenskyy like an ungrateful child. Vance – who recently went to Munich to condemn Europe as being on the wrong side in the culture wars – demanded: “Have you said ‘thank you’ once?”Zelenskyy tried to respond. Trump told him his country was in big trouble. He went on: “The problem is I’ve empowered you to be a tough guy and I don’t think you’d be a tough guy without the United States and your people are very brave. But, you’re either going to make a deal or we’re out.“And if we’re out, you’ll fight it out and I don’t think it’s going to be pretty… But you’re not acting at all thankful, and that’s not a nice thing.”Zelenskyy looked shellshocked and Trump commented on what great TV it will be.No deal was done and a planned press conference was cancelled. Zelenskyy drove away empty-handed, having just endured own diplomatic Chernobyl. As for the rest of Europe, a bust of Winston Churchill, looming over the shoulders of Trump and Vance, may have shed a tear or two. More

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      America must not surrender its Democratic values | Bernie Sanders

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      For 250 years, the United States has held itself up as a symbol of democracy – an example of freedom and self-governance to which the rest of the world could aspire. People have long looked to our declaration of independence and constitution as blueprints for how to guarantee those human rights and freedoms.Tragically, all of that is changing. As Donald Trump moves this country towards authoritarianism, he is aligning himself with dictators and despots who share his disdain for democracy and the rule of law.This week, in a radical departure from longstanding US policy, the Trump administration voted against a United Nations resolution which clearly stated that Russia began the horrific war with Ukraine. That resolution also called on Russia to withdraw its forces from occupied Ukraine, in line with international law. The resolution was brought forward by our closest allies, including the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan and dozens more democratic nations. And 93 countries voted “yes”.Rather than side with our longstanding allies to preserve democracy and uphold international law, the president voted with authoritarian countries such as Russia, North Korea, Iran and Belarus to oppose the resolution. Many of the other opponents of that resolution are undemocratic nations propped up by Russian military aid.Let’s be clear: this was not just another UN vote. This was the president of the United States turning his back on 250 years of our history and openly aligning himself with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. This was the president of the United States undermining the independence of Ukraine.And let us not forget who Putin is. He is the man who crushed Russia’s movement towards democracy after the end of the cold war. He steals elections, murders political dissidents and crushes freedom of the press. He has maintained control in Russia by offering the oligarchs there a simple deal: if you give me absolute power, I will let you steal as much as you want from the Russian people. He sparked the bloodiest war in Europe since the second world war.It has been three years since Russia’s brutal, unprovoked, full-scale invasion of Ukraine. More than 1 million people have been killed or injured because of Putin’s aggression. Every single day, Russia rains down hundreds of missiles and drones on Ukrainian cities. Putin’s forces have massacred civilians and kidnapped thousands of Ukrainian children, bringing them back to Russian “re-education” camps. These atrocities led the international criminal court to issue an arrest warrant for Putin in 2023 as a war criminal.Not only is Trump aligning himself with Putin’s Russia, he is prepared to extort Ukraine for its natural resources. While a proud nation desperately fights for its life, Trump is focused on helping his billionaire friends make a fortune excavating rare earths and other minerals.But Trump’s turn toward authoritarianism and rejection of international law goes well beyond Ukraine.The president sees the world’s dictators as his friends, our democratic allies as his enemies and the use of military force as the way to achieve his goals. Disgracefully, he wants to push 2.2 million Palestinians out of their homeland in order to build a billionaire’s playground in Gaza. He talks openly about annexing Greenland from Denmark. He says the United States should take back the Panama canal. And he ruptures our friendship with our Canadian neighbors by telling them they should become the 51st state in the union.Alongside his fellow oligarchs in Russia, Saudi Arabia and around the globe, Trump wants a world ruled by authoritarians in which might makes right, and where democracy and moral values cease to exist.Just over a century ago, a handful of monarchs, emperors and tsars ruled most of the world. Sitting in extreme opulence, they claimed that absolute power was their “divine right”. But ordinary people disagreed.Slowly and painfully, in countries throughout the world, they clawed their way toward democracy and rejected colonialism.At our best, the US has played a key role in the movement toward freedom. From Gettysburg to Normandy, millions of Americans have fought – and many have died – to defend democracy, often alongside brave men and women from other nations.This is a turning point – a moment of enormous consequence in world history. Do we go forward toward a more democratic, just and humane world? Or do we retreat back into oligarchy, authoritarianism, colonialism and the rejection of international law?As Americans, we cannot stay quiet as Trump abandons centuries of our commitment to democracy. Together, we must fight for our long-held values and work with people around the world who share them.

      Bernie Sanders is a US senator and a ranking member of the health, education, labor and pensions committee. He represents the state of Vermont and is the longest-serving independent in the history of Congress More

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      The question no one dares ask: what if Britain has to defend itself from the US? | George Monbiot

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      All the talk now is of how we might defend ourselves without the US. But almost everyone with a voice in public life appears to be avoiding a much bigger and more troubling question: how we might defend ourselves against the US.As Keir Starmer visits the orange emperor’s court in Washington, let’s first consider the possibilities. I can’t comment on their likelihood, and I fervently hope that people with more knowledge and power than me are gaming them. One is that Donald Trump will not only clear the path for Vladimir Putin in Ukraine, but will actively assist him. We know that Trump can brook no challenge to his hegemony. Russia is no threat to US dominance, but Europe, with a combined economy similar to that of the US, and a powerful diplomatic and global political presence, could be.Putin has long sought to break up the EU, using the European far right as his proxies: this is why he invested so heavily in Brexit. Now Trump, in turn, could use Putin as his proxy, to attack a rival centre of power. If Trump helps Russia sweep through Ukraine, Putin could then issue an ultimatum to other frontline and eastern European states: leave the EU, leave Nato and become a client state like Belarus, or you’re next. In Hungary, Viktor Orbán might agree to this. If Călin Georgescu wins in Romania in May, he might too.What form could US support for Putin in Ukraine take? It could involve intelligence sharing. It could involve permanently withdrawing Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite internet service from Ukraine, which is strategically crucial there, while making it available to the Russian armed forces. Already, the US government has threatened to nix the service if Ukraine doesn’t hand over its minerals, as reparations for being invaded. This is how Trump operates: blackmailing desperate people who are seeking to defend themselves against an imperial war, regardless of past alliances. In the extreme case, Trump’s support for Russia might involve military equipment and financial backing, or even joint US-Russian operations, in the Arctic or elsewhere.Now consider our vulnerabilities. Through the “Five Eyes” partnership, the UK automatically shares signals intelligence, human intelligence and defence intelligence with the US government. Edward Snowden’s revelations showed that the US, with the agreement of our government, conducts wholesale espionage on innocent UK citizens. The two governments, with other western nations, run a wide range of joint intelligence programmes, such as Prism, Echelon, Tempora and XKeyscore. The US National Security Agency (NSA) uses the UK agency GCHQ as a subcontractor.All this is now overseen by Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s director of national intelligence, in charge of the CIA, NSA and 16 other agencies. After she recited conspiracy fictions seeded by the Syrian and Russian governments, she was widely accused of being a “Russian asset” or a “Russian puppet”. At what point do we conclude that by sharing intelligence with the US, the UK might as well be sharing it with Russia?View image in fullscreenDepending on whose definitions you accept, the US has either 11 or 13 military bases and listening stations in the UK. They include the misnamed RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk, actually a US air force base, from which it deploys F-35 jets; RAF Menwith Hill in North Yorkshire, in reality a US NSA base conducting military espionage and operational support; RAF Croughton, part-operated by the CIA, which allegedly used the base to spy on Angela Merkel among many others; and RAF Fylingdales, part of the US Space Surveillance Network. If the US now sides with Russia against the UK and Europe, these could just as well be Russian bases and listening stations.Then we come to our weapon systems. Like everyone without security clearance, I can make no well-informed statement on the extent to which any of them, nuclear or conventional, are operationally independent of the US. But I know, to give just one example, that among the crucial components of our defence are F-35 stealth jets, designed and patented in the US. How stealthy they will turn out to be, when the US has the specs, the serial numbers and the software, is a question that needs an urgent answer.Nor can I make any confident statement about the extent to which weapons designed here might be dependent on US central processing units and other digital technologies, or on US systems such as Starlink, owned by Musk, or GPS, owned by the US Space Force. Which of our weapons systems could achieve battle-readiness without US involvement and consent? Which could be remotely disabled by the US military? At the very least, the US will know better than any other power how to combat them, because our weapons are more or less the same as theirs. In other words, if the US is now our enemy, the enemy is inside the gate.Much as I hate to admit it, the UK needs to rearm (though cutting the aid budget to find the money, as Keir Starmer intends, is astonishingly shortsighted). I reluctantly came to this conclusion as Trump’s numbers began to stack up last July. But, if they are fatally compromised by US penetration, rearmament might have to begin with the complete abandonment of our existing weapons and communications systems.This may need to start very soon. On 24 February, the UN general assembly voted on a Ukrainian resolution, co-sponsored by the UK and other European nations, condemning Russia’s invasion. Unsurprisingly, Russia, Belarus, North Korea, Hungary and several small and easily cowed states voted against it. But so did the US andIsrael. This, more clearly than any other shift, exposes the new alignment. An axis of autocracy, facilitating an imperial war of aggression, confronts nations committed (albeit to varying degrees) to democracy and international law.For many years, we have been urged to trust the UK’s oppressive “security state”. Yes, this security state is yanked around like a fish on a line by the US government, with such catastrophic outcomes as the US-UK invasion of Iraq. Yes, it is engaged in mass surveillance of its own citizens. But, its defenders have long argued, we should suck all this up because the security state is essential to our defence from hostile foreign actors. In reality, our entanglement, as many of us have long warned, presents a major threat to national security. By tying our defence so closely to the US, our governments have created an insecurity state.I hope you can now see what a terrible mistake the UK has made, and how we should have followed France in creating more independent military and security systems. Disentangling from the US will be difficult and expensive. Failing to do so could carry a far higher price.

      George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist More

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      Top Democrat says Trump may seek mineral deal with both Russia and Ukraine

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      Donald Trump may be pursuing a mineral rights deal with Vladimir Putin and Russia as well as with Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Ukraine, a top Senate Democrat has warned, discussing the US president’s demand that Kyiv grant US firms access to 50% of its rare-earth reserves, as a price for helping end the war three years after Russia invaded.“I think anything that helps position Ukraine for any peace negotiations is a positive move,” said Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the ranking Democrat on the Senate foreign relations and armed services committee, who recently visited Ukraine.“Now, what we heard when we were in Ukraine is that 40-50% of those mineral deposits are actually in territory controlled by the Russians. Maybe part of the deal is President Trump is going to get a deal with Vladimir Putin on the mineral rights too. So … that could be a little tricky.”Shaheen was speaking to the One Decision podcast, hosted by the former MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove, the former CIA director Leon Panetta and the reporter Christina Ruffini.Saying Ukraine cannot expect to regain all territory taken by Russia, and rejecting Kyiv’s aim of joining Nato, Trump has demanded a deal with Ukraine as repayment for military support. On Wednesday, Trump said Zelenskyy would visit Washington on Friday to sign a “very big agreement that will be on rare earth and other things”.Trump did not offer details of a deal but said he was “not going to make security guarantees beyond very much,” adding: “We’re going to have Europe do that.”Trump is due to meet Keir Starmer, the British prime minister, on Thursday. Starmer has said the UK is willing to contribute peacekeeping troops.Shaheen said: “I do think there is support to do everything we can to help get a peace in Ukraine. And from my perspective, one of the most important aspects of that is ensuring that the Ukrainians are positioned in the most positive, favorable way for them. If this deal helps with that, and President Zelenskyy is comfortable signing it, then I support that.”Shaheen said her visit to Ukraine, with fellow Democrat Michael Bennet, of Colorado, and Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican, proved “compelling, disturbing”.The senators visited Bucha, where Russian troops carried out a massacre in 2022. The town “showed the resilience of the Ukrainian people,” Shaheen said, adding: “They’re willing to resist. And it showed just what a murderous thug Vladimir Putin is.”Shaheen said the senators “met with the mayor of Bucha, we met with the priest. There had been a mass grave of a couple of hundred of the civilians who were killed. There were over 500 killed in Bucha in that 33-day siege [the final toll is unclear]. It was horrific. It was absolutely brutal. Finding the graves, taking the corpses out of the graves.“We met with the investigators who were investigating each murder individually, and they showed us the picture of the Russian commander who had given the order. And it was very clear that the order was to frighten the civilians, to do everything you can to try and reduce any resistance from the civilians. And for me … I thought this was a small village someplace in the hinterlands of Ukraine, but it’s not, it’s a suburb of Kyiv, and the tanks were stopped right there at the suburb.“So it really pointed out the stark contrast between the Russians and the Ukrainians and what’s at stake in this war.”Trump has stirred huge controversy by seeming to favor Putin and Russia in regards to the war in Ukraine, not least by beginning talks for a settlement without including Ukraine or European powers.Asked about Trump’s lie that Zelenskyy was a dictator who started the war, Shaheen said: “It’s very distressing. And the president’s wrong. He’s just wrong … Vladimir Putin is the dictator. President Zelenskiy was duly elected by the people of Ukraine, and he has a higher favorability rating than Donald Trump.” More

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      The Guardian view on Trump’s realignment: the geopolitical plates are moving. Brace for further shocks | Editorial

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      The rumblings prompted by Donald Trump’s re-election soon gathered force. First came tariffs and threats of territorial annexation; then the greater shocks of JD Vance’s Valentine’s Day massacre of European values and Mr Trump’s enthusiastic amplification of Kremlin lines on Ukraine.On Monday came another seismic moment. For more than a decade, the UN security council has been largely paralysed by the split between the five permanent members – Russia and China on one side; the US, France and Britain on the other. This time, when the US brought a resolution calling for an end to the war in Ukraine on the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion, it did not criticise Moscow, demand its withdrawal or back Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. The result was that China and Russia backed the resolution – while the UK and France, having failed to temper it, abstained.Earlier, even Beijing had chosen to abstain rather than reject a UN general assembly resolution condemning Moscow as the aggressor in Ukraine. It was passed overwhelmingly, with the backing of 93 states. Yet the US joined Russia in voting against it – along with Belarus, North Korea, Syria and a handful of others. “These are not our friends,” the Republican senator John Curtis wrote on X.The post-1945 order is beyond repair while Mr Trump occupies the White House. Emmanuel Macron’s charm and deftness papered over the problems somewhat when he became the first European leader to meet the US president since his re-election. (Sir Keir Starmer, not noted for his nimbleness or charisma, is likely to find the task somewhat harder this week.) The French president was adroit in flattering Mr Trump even as he told the truth. But it is not surprising that he failed to make any real progress in closing the gap. These are not cracks in the transatlantic relationship, but a chasm.A committed Atlanticist such as Friedrich Merz, on course to shortly become the German chancellor, is compelled to urge independence from the US because “the Americans, at any case the Americans in this administration, do not care much about the fate of Europe”. He warned that European leaders might not be able to talk about Nato in its current form by June. The problem is not only what Mr Trump may do but what he may not. Nato is built on the conviction that countries will stand by the commitments they make. That confidence cannot exist while Mr Trump is president.When Sir Keir told MPs on Tuesday that “Here we are, in a world where everything has changed”, he was commenting on Russian aggression, but everyone understood the real shift underlying his remarks. To note, as he did, that the US-British alliance has survived countless external challenges was not quite a vote of confidence. It tacitly acknowledged that the threat this time is internal.The ground is rocking beneath Europe’s feet. It must brace itself for further shocks. In place of the post-second world war order, Mr Trump envisages a world where alliances are no more than empty words and great powers bluff and bully their way through. Bilateral meetings have their purpose – they may offer minimal respite and buy a little time – but it will require common will to defend the interests of European states. The Polish prime minister, Donald Tusk, suggested that European leaders would be meeting in London at the weekend to discuss security. Their best hope of standing firm is by standing together.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. More

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      Trump ‘surrendering to the Russians’ on Ukraine, top Democrat says

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      A senior Democratic lawmaker accused Donald Trump of “surrendering to the Russians” on Sunday, as Trump special envoy Steve Witkoff said talks between the US and Russia over Ukraine was “the only way to end the carnage”.In an interview on ABC News’ This Week, Democratic senator Jack Reed, a senior member of the Armed Services Committee, hit out at Trump’s recent verbal attacks on Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy and increased alignment with Russia.“Essentially, this is President Trump surrendering to the Russians,” Reed said. “This is not a statesman or a diplomat. This is just someone who admires Putin, does not believe in the struggle of the Ukrainians and is committed to cozying up to an autocrat.”But senior administration officials sought to side-step accusations that Trump’s re-positioning of US policies on Ukraine, including a possible deal for Ukraine to repay US military and financial support with rare-earth materials, amounted to a capitulation to the Russian position on the war.Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy to the mideast who revealed this week that he had “spent a lot of time with President Putin”, during a recent trip to Moscow, “talking, developing a friendship, a relationship with him”, declined to blame Russia for starting war in Ukraine, calling Ukraine’s ambitions to join Nato “a threat to the Russians”.“The war didn’t need to happen – it was provoked. It doesn’t necessarily mean it was provoked by the Russians,” Witkoff said on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday.“There were all kinds of conversations back then about Ukraine joining Nato”, he said. “That didn’t need to happen. It basically became a threat to the Russians and so we have to deal with that fact.”Witkoff’s remarks come days after he, along with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and national security adviser Mike Waltz, held talks in Saudi Arabia with Russian officials over re-establishing diplomatic relations and a Russia-Ukraine peace deal.Ukrainian officials said they were not invited to the meeting, and later said they would not accept a peace deal imposed on them. But Ukraine’s position later appeared to shift after Trump called Zelenskyy a “dictator without elections” who “better move fast or he is not going to have a country left”.On Sunday, Zelenskyy said he wanted Trump to be a close partner to Ukraine, not just a mediator between two superpowers, the US and Russia, and would be willing to step down, if it would secure lasting peace for his country.“If, to achieve peace, you really need me to give up my post, I’m ready. I can exchange it for Nato [membership]”, he said. “I don’t plan to stay in power for decades” he added. “But we won’t let Putin stay in power over Ukrainian territories either.”That came as President Putin appointed the chief of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, Kirill Dmitriev, as a special envoy on international economic and investment cooperation with western nations “including the United States of America”. Dmitriev, considered the most US-savvy member of Russia’s elite, was part of the Russian delegation that met with US counterparts in Riyadh.Nato membership for Ukraine has all-but been ruled out by the US negotiators. The defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, confirmed to Fox News Sunday that no US troops would be part of any future peace-keeping force in Ukraine and dodged the question over responsibility for starting the bloody three-year conflict.“Does all the finger-pointing and pearl clutching make peace more likely? That’s the enduring question the president is asking. He wants peace, and if that’s the case, you’ve got to stare down the Russians, and Vladimir Putin, and who they’ve chosen to negotiate and have earnest conversations about difficult things,” Hegseth told his former colleague Shannon Bream.“Standing here and saying, ‘You’re good, you’re bad; you’re a dictator, you’re not a dictator; you invaded, you didn’t’, it’s not useful, it’s not productive. So President Trump isn’t getting drawn into that in unnecessary ways and as a result, we’re closer to peace than ever before,” Hegseth added.The White House continued its pushback against claims that it has pivoted to Russia’s position on the war. “President Trump’s peace through strength America First diplomacy effectively deterred Russia in his first term, and this war would have never started if he had never left office,” said the White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt in an email to the Wall Street Journal.Leavitt said Trump was “actively pressing both sides to end this brutal conflict once and for all”. More