Trump: Ukraine will have to keep fighting if Zelenskyy rejects "peace plan"
US President Donald Trump has stated that if Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy does not accept the "peace plan", he will have to continue fighting.
Source: White House broadcast; Interfax-Ukraine
Details: Trump believes that the US plan for a ceasefire is a way to achieve peace and Zelenskyy "is going to have to approve it".
"And if he doesn't like it, then they should just keep fighting," he told reporters in the Oval Office.
Quote: "At some point, he's going to have to accept something he hasn't accepted. You remember, right, in the Oval Office not so long ago, I said, 'You don't have the cards'.
Don't forget, I inherited this war. This war never would have happened. I inherited this war. And I thought, he should have made a deal a year ago, two years ago.
The ultimate deal would have been if it never started. That would have been a good deal. That could have been done, too, if you had the right president. But you didn't have the right president."
Details: Trump stressed that the coming winter could prove to be "cold" and that Ukraine's energy infrastructure has suffered many heavy attacks. He again insisted that if he had been president, this war would not have happened and added that he has "a very good relationship" with Putin, but "it does take two to tango".
Background:
- On the night of 20-21 November, Axios published the full list of points in the new US "peace plan" presented to Ukraine.
- It was reported earlier that Zelenskyy may hold talks with his US counterpart Donald Trump about the "peace plan" next week.
- Reuters reported, citing sources, that US officials have threatened to stop supplying weapons and intelligence to Ukraine in order to secure Kyiv's agreement to the US "peace plan".
- On 21 November, Zelenskyy addressed the Ukrainian people and said Ukraine now faces a difficult choice: it risks losing either its dignity or its key partner.
- On the evening of 21 November, Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin claimed that Russia is ready to "show flexibility" regarding a peace settlement in Ukraine but is also satisfied with the "dynamics of the special military operation" [as the Russians refer to their unprovoked war of aggression against Ukraine – ed.].
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