Trump “doesn’t care” what happens to Ukraine, says former foreign minister

The president of the United States, Donald Trump, does not seem worried about the future of the postwar period of Ukraine, said former foreign minister of the country, Dmytro Kuleba, to CNBC in the midst of a rapid climb of tensions between kyiv and Washington this week.

“I don’t think he cares. It’s okay, let me say even more simple.

Kuleba, who directed the Ukraine Ministry of Foreign Affairs since 2020 Until his resignation in the fall of 2024He said Trump’s only concern, that Ukraine did not become a failed state as Afghanistan, and that his Ukraine plan “does not collapse in a way that exposes his weakness to everyone … because he has zero tolerance to failures. “

“We know him, and this is the problem. Therefore, it is not about saying how good Ukraine is and how he deserves his support. It makes no sense, because it is not as he thinks,” Kuleba said. CNBC has contacted the White House to obtain a response to Kuleba’s comments and is waiting for an answer.

Kuleba left the position in September 2024 in the midst of an important reorganization of the cabinet designed to refresh the Ukrainian government and put new ideas in the foreground, at a time when the Russian forces began to obtain earnings arranged in the east of the country.

The comments of the former war minister to CNBC occur as these territorial advances continue, while kyiv’s relationship with the United States, its greatest military sponsor since the beginning of the war in 2022, seems to be deteriorating the day.

The ties have been tensioned since the inauguration of President Donald Trump in January. The White House leader and senior Republican officials have expressed skepticism that Ukraine can win the conflict, holding that it has become a war of wear.

The tensions between Ukraine and the United States reached a critical point this week, since the senior officials of the White Houses met their Russian counterparts in Saudi Arabia with the aim of laying the foundations for peace conversations in Ukraine, the entire Time excludes kyiv officials participating in discussions.

The relations between Trump and the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, went bad to worse on Wednesday, since the latter described the president of the United States as “living in a Russian misinformation bubble.”

Trump replied, Describing the war leader of Ukraine was a “dictator without elections”, Referring to the lack of a national vote in the country in conflict since 2019. Ukraine has suspended elections in the midst of martial law.

Trump amazed Ukraine and his European allies last week when he announced that he had spoken with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and that the leaders had agreed to hold peace conversations to end the war. Trump said he had later informed Zelenskyy about the situation, causing the gesture to appear as a late occurrence.

Kuleba was cynical about the perspective of peace conversations, saying that Putin was not interested in an agreement.

“(Putin) wants to bother Donald Trump. That is his strategy. He doesn’t want a deal. He doesn’t want a strip of Ukrainian land. He doesn’t want Ukrainian NATO. He doesn’t want Ukraine. He wants Ukraine not to exist. And there should be no illusions About that, “Kuleba said.

“You can see very different tones and approaches on both sides. And the fact that the United States delegation seems so excited is a bit strange. I think they need to reduce speed, because they have to understand the side with which they are working, “he said.

Kuleba said the Trump administration had overestimated its ability to influence Putin, claiming that the Russian president had an innate distrust of the West.

“Putin does not trust Trump for (a) a very simple reason, because he does not know if Trump’s promises will be … and does not need a temporary solution. He knows that the best guarantee for him (is) that Ukraine not becoming NATO member, and the absence of Ukraine.

CNBC has contacted the Kremlin for an answer to Kuleba’s comments and is waiting for an answer.

The special envoy of the United States for Ukraine and Russia Keith Kellogg was in kyiv on Thursday to contact Zelenskyy, but doubts persist for the value of the meeting. Kellogg was absent from the US delegation that went to Riyadh in the early.

The Ukrainian President and Kellogg were destined to hold a joint press conference after their meeting, but this was canceled at the request of the United States, said the presidential office of Ukraine, according to a Reuters report.

The current Foreign Minister of Ukraine, Andrii Sybiha, said he had discussed ways to achieve fair and lasting peace with the American envoy.

“I affirmed the will of Ukraine to achieve peace through force and our vision for the necessary steps,” Sybiha He said on the social media platform Xadding that it had “repeated that the security of Ukraine and the transatlantic is indivisible.”

On Thursday, the White House National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz, told Ukraine that he needed to reduce criticism to the United States, saying that US officials were trying to ensure an acceptable peace agreement for all parties.

“They need to attenuate it and take a look and sign that agreement,” Waltz told Fox News, referring to a critical mineral agreement in which Trump proposed to Ukraine that kyiv should grant him 50% owned by his rare minerals of rare earths . Reward for military aid that has given Ukraine.

Zelenskyy According to reports, he has ordered his ministers not to sign any agreement, that Trump had said previously would give the United States access to $ 500 billion in rare earth mineralssaying that the proposal was too focused on the interests of the United States and offered Ukraine very little in return.