Zelensky, Volodymyr

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      Putin Visits Kursk to Cheer Russian Troops Trying to Oust Ukraine

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      The trip comes as President Trump looks to secure the Russian leader’s support for a 30-day cease-fire.Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, dressed in fatigues, visited a command post near the front in Kursk late Wednesday to cheer on his military’s ejection of Ukrainian forces from much of the territory they had been occupying in the Russian border region.The Russian leader’s pointed visit came a day after a U.S. delegation met in Saudi Arabia with Ukrainian officials, who agreed to a 30-day cease-fire in the war. American officials planned to take the proposal to Mr. Putin, who has previously said he is not interested in a temporary truce.Dressed in a green camouflage uniform, Mr. Putin sat at a desk with maps spread out in front of him, according to photos released by the Kremlin. He appeared with Russia’s top military officer, Gen. Valery V. Gerasimov.In video footage released by Russian state media, Mr. Putin praised the Russian military formations that had taken back much of the territory captured by Ukraine in the Kursk region. He called on the troops to seize the territory for good from Ukrainian forces, who have been occupying portions of the Russian border region since last summer. Kyiv had hoped to use the territory as a bargaining chip in peace talks.The Russian leader also demanded that Ukrainian forces taken prisoner in the region be treated and prosecuted as terrorists under Russian law. General Gerasimov said more than 400 Ukrainian troops had been captured in the operations.“People who are on the territory of the Kursk region, committing crimes here against the civilian population and opposing our armed forces, law enforcement agencies and special services, in accordance with the laws of the Russian Federation, are terrorists,” Mr. Putin said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Europe Welcomes a Ukraine Cease-Fire Offer and a Revival of U.S. Aid

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      Europeans reacted with relief to the announcement on Tuesday that Ukraine had agreed with the United States on a 30-day cease-fire in its war with Russia and anxiously awaited Moscow’s response.They were relieved because Washington announced simultaneously that it would immediately restore military and intelligence support for Ukraine. And there was expectation that Russia must now respond in kind, or presumably President Trump would put some kind of pressure on Moscow analogous at least to the blunt instruments he used against Ukraine.“The ball is now in Russia’s court,” said the two European Union leaders, António Costa and Ursula von der Leyen, in coordinated messages on social media welcoming the deal and echoing the statement of Secretary of State Marco Rubio.But in the same sentence the European leaders also welcomed the resumption of U.S. security support to Ukraine, giving it equal emphasis.“We welcome today’s news from Jeddah on the U.S.-Ukraine talks, including the proposal for a cease-fire agreement and the resumption of U.S. intelligence sharing and security assistance,” the message said on Tuesday. “This is a positive development that can be a step toward a comprehensive, just and lasting peace for Ukraine.”They also tried to remind Mr. Trump and his team that if Washington wants Europe to guarantee any peace deal in Ukraine, Europe wants to be at the negotiating table. “The European Union,” the message said (hint, hint), “is ready to play its full part, together with its partners, in the upcoming peace negotiations.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump’s Attacks Give Zelensky a Popularity Boost in Ukraine

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      The Ukrainian leader’s approval rating is rising, and critics have backed off after he was humiliated and criticized by President Trump, who has also demanded new elections in Ukraine.President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine was losing popularity at home for months, seen by many as a thin-skinned leader who had concentrated power around him. Political opponents saw an opening to win a future election against him. His former top general in the war against Russia had a higher approval rating.Enter President Trump. In recent weeks, he has echoed Moscow’s talking points on the war and called Mr. Zelensky a “dictator without elections” who “has done a terrible job.” Mr. Trump and his allies have demanded new presidential elections in Ukraine, despite the war, and humiliated Mr. Zelensky at a disastrous meeting in the White House.But Mr. Trump’s actions appear to have helped the Ukrainian leader at home.Mr. Zelensky’s approval ratings have risen, according to two recent polls, and his political opponents have said publicly that now is not the time for elections. Suggestions by political opponents and some analysts that Mr. Zelensky should share power and form a coalition government — a Ukrainian team of rivals — have not gained traction. And even if critics haven’t exactly rallied around the president, they haven’t outright attacked him.“Some people expected me to criticize Zelensky,” Petro Poroshenko, Mr. Zelensky’s predecessor as Ukraine’s president and a frequent needler-in-chief, said after the explosive meeting between Mr. Zelensky and Mr. Trump. “But no, there will be no criticism, because that’s not what the country needs right now.”Mr. Zelensky is still in a precarious position. He needs to somehow chart a path forward with a U.S. president who clearly wants to deal with a different Ukrainian leader.Mr. Zelensky has offered to step down in exchange for peace or Ukraine’s membership in NATO. Political opponents have agreed that elections cannot be held while the country is at war, because frontline troops and Ukrainians outside the country cannot vote. But given that Ukraine was to hold an election in spring 2024, they will probably push for one if a cease-fire is reached — likely long before a final peace deal is inked. And opposition politicians seem to be biding their time, despite public calls for unity.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      In Speech to Congress, Trump Is Expected to Boast About DOGE Cuts and Ukraine

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      President Trump is expected to boast about his assault on the federal bureaucracy and his efforts to upend global relationships during an address to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, even as his administration faces lawsuits over his domestic agenda and Europe rebukes him over his treatment of Ukraine.Addressing his largest television audience since his return to power, Mr. Trump is expected to speak about the speed with which he has pushed through reductions in border crossings, cuts to government through the Department of Government Efficiency, known as DOGE, and a slew of executive orders. He is also expected to emphasize the need to pass his legislative agenda, which includes some $4 trillion in tax cuts.“He’s going to talk about the great things he’s done: The border’s secure, the waste he’s finding with DOGE,” said Representative Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio and the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who speaks frequently with Mr. Trump. “He’s going to keep laying out his vision, where he wants the country to go.”For Mr. Trump, it will be a remarkable return to a chamber — and a prime-time, nationwide audience — he last addressed five years ago, before voters ousted him from office and replaced him with Joseph R. Biden Jr. Mr. Trump’s return has set in motion a rapid-fire series of actions designed to overturn decades of policy and diplomacy.During his first term, the president delivered an annual speech to Congress that included a mix of exaggerations and grievance-filled attacks on his enemies. He is poised to do the same again on Tuesday night, using one of the largest platforms that any modern president gets during his time in the Oval Office.Mr. Trump hinted on Monday that he might use the speech to extend his public feud with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine after the Oval Office blowup between the two leaders last week. Asked by a reporter whether a deal to share rare-earth minerals was still possible after the shouting, Mr. Trump said that “I’ll let you know,” adding: “We’re making a speech, you probably heard.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Europe Races to Repair a Split Between the U.S. and Ukraine

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      European leaders raced on Sunday to salvage Ukraine’s relationship with the United States, after a bitter rupture last week between President Volodymyr Zelensky and President Trump. They pledged to assemble a European “coalition of the willing” to develop a plan for ending Ukraine’s war with Russia, which they hope could win the backing of a skeptical Mr. Trump.Gathering in London at the invitation of Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Britain, the leaders vowed to bolster support for Ukraine. But they also expressed hope that Mr. Zelensky and Mr. Trump could repair their breach, underscoring Europe’s reluctance to cast off a trans-Atlantic alliance that has kept the peace for 80 years.“We have to bridge this,” Mr. Starmer said on Sunday to the BBC before the leaders began arriving at Lancaster House, near Buckingham Palace. “We have to find a way where we can all work together.”Mr. Starmer said he believed that despite Mr. Trump’s anger toward Mr. Zelensky in the Oval Office on Friday, the president was committed to a lasting peace agreement between Ukraine and Russia. He said Britain and France, working with other European countries, would develop their own plan with Mr. Zelensky.Details of the plan were sketchy, but Mr. Starmer suggested that the Europeans could use it as a basis to persuade Mr. Trump to commit to American security guarantees. Britain and France have already pledged to contribute troops to a peacekeeping force and are trying to enlist other countries across Europe.“I think we’ve got a step in the right direction,” Mr. Starmer said, though he added that “this is a moment of real fragility in Europe.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Shocked by Trump Meeting, Zelensky and Ukraine Try to Forge a Path Forward

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      For months leading into the American elections last fall, the prospect of a second Trump presidency deepened uncertainty among Ukrainians over how enduring American support would prove in a war threatening their national survival.After President Volodymyr Zelensky’s disastrous meeting with President Trump in the White House on Friday, many Ukrainians were moving toward a conclusion that seemed perfectly clear: Mr. Trump has chosen a side, and it is not Ukraine’s.In one jaw-dropping meeting, the once unthinkable fear that Ukraine would be forced to engage in a long war against a stronger opponent without U.S. support appeared to move exponentially closer to reality.“For Ukraine, it is clarifying, though not in a great way,” Phillips O’Brien, an international relations professor at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, said in an interview. “Ukraine can now only count on European states for the support it needs to fight.”An immediate result was that Ukrainians, including opposition politicians, were generally supportive of Mr. Zelensky on Saturday for not bending to Mr. Trump despite tremendous pressure.Maryna Schomak, a civilian whose son’s cancer diagnosis has been complicated by the destruction of Ukraine’s largest children’s cancer hospital by a Russian missile strike, said that Mr. Zelensky had conducted himself with dignity.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump’s Dressing Down of Zelensky Plays Into Putin’s War Aims

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      President Trump says he wants a quick cease-fire in Ukraine. But President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia appears to be in no rush, and the blowup on Friday between Mr. Trump and Ukraine’s president may give Russia’s leader the kind of ammunition he needs to prolong the fight.With the American alliance with Ukraine suffering a dramatic, public rupture, Mr. Putin now seems even more likely to hold out for a deal on his terms — and he could even be tempted to expand his push on the battlefield.The extraordinary scene in Washington — in which Mr. Trump lambasted President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine — was broadcast as the top story on state television in Russia on Saturday morning. It played into three years of Kremlin propaganda casting Mr. Zelensky as a foolhardy ruler who would sooner or later exhaust the patience of his Western backers.For the Kremlin, perhaps the most important message came in later remarks by Mr. Trump, who suggested that if Ukraine did not agree to a “cease-fire now,” the war-torn country would have to “fight it out” without American help.That could set up an outcome that Mr. Putin has long sought, at the cost of tens of thousands of Russian lives: a dominant position over Ukraine and wide-ranging concessions from the West.In fact, Mr. Trump’s professed attempts to end the war quickly could intensify and prolong it, experts warned. If the United States is really ready to abandon Ukraine, Mr. Putin could try to seize more Ukrainian territory and end up with more leverage if and when peace talks ultimately take place.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Sums Up His Zelensky Showdown: ‘This Is Going to Be Great Television’

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      One of the most surreal moments of Friday’s Oval Office showdown between President Trump and President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine came at the very end.After all the shouting and the saber-rattling and the lecturing and the pleading and the politicking had ceased, the American president shifted a little in his seat and shared an observation.“This is going to be great television,” he remarked. “I will say that.”It was a conclusion as startling as it was fundamentally Trumpian.This was not a season finale boardroom scene of “The Apprentice” that had just taken place. It was the highest of high-stakes talks — one that could determine the fate of millions, the existence of a sovereign nation and the security of a continent — going wildly off the rails.But for Mr. Trump, one thing that was on his mind, as always, was the ratings. He sounded almost excited by the drama of the spectacle, as though he could feel the front pages of the world’s newspapers being written in real time.This is a man who spent years yelling at people on TV as a way to make a living. He is wired to think about things in terms of “great television.” He is a highly conscious performer. But playacting as a tough guy on NBC on Thursday nights between 9 and 10 p.m. is not the same thing as bossing around an ally before the eyes of the world, even if Mr. Trump uses the same language to describe one performance as he would the other.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More