Trump seeks meeting with Putin as Biden announces aid package to Kyiv

President-elect Donald Trump raised the possibility of a meeting with Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin to end the “bloody mess” in Ukraine, as Joe Biden’s outgoing administration pushed through its final aid package for its battered ally kyiv.

“He wants to meet and… we’re setting it up,” Trump said during a news conference Thursday, noting that he would prefer to postpone the meeting until after his presidential inauguration on Jan. 20. It has not yet been decided whether the meeting will be held as a summit or a state visit.

“President Putin wants to meet. He’s even said it publicly. And we have to end that war once and for all, it’s a bloody disaster. Millions of soldiers are being killed,” Trump said. “The big surprise, and this is going to be a very unpleasant surprise, is how many people died in that war.”

Trump has historically enjoyed a more cordial relationship with Putin than many Western heads of state, who have increasingly distanced themselves from the Kremlin since Moscow’s invasion of its Eastern European neighbor in February 2022.

The strength of Trump’s relationship with Putin came under scrutiny in a nearly two-year investigation by the special counsel into allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump, who was victorious in the vote, denied claims that had fallen under the influence of the Kremlin.

Putin is ready to meet Trump without reservations, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Friday in a message translated by Google. comments Russian state news agency Tass reported. He added that the details of such an approach had not yet been agreed and will likely be watching Trump’s inauguration, noting that Russia welcomes the president-elect’s intentions to resort to dialogue.

Western-led efforts to mediate a peace deal, along with the respective frameworks of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and influential Chinese mediator Xi Jinping, have yet to be mutually accepted or bear fruit. So far, Moscow and kyiv have drawn mutually contradictory red lines, refusing to join the negotiating table unless they are allowed to retain the annexed territories or until Russian troops have abandoned Ukrainian lands, respectively.

Trump’s openness to contacts with Putin marks a departure from the relationship guided for the past two years by the Biden administration, a staunch supporter of Ukraine throughout the conflict.

The Biden administration has committed approximately $65.9 billion in security assistance to kyiv since the start of the invasion. starting January 8. On Thursday, the United States Department of Defense announced a $500 billion aid tranche for Ukrainejust 10 days before Biden’s scheduled departure from the White House.

Questions remain about the extent of US involvement in the devastating war in Ukraine, which will enter its third year next month and has indirectly driven increases in energy prices and global inflation due to Western resource sanctions. Russians. Trump has previously touted that he could resolve the devastating war in Ukraine within an ambitious “24 hours,” without revealing his methods or presenting a concrete ceasefire proposal.

He also vehemently criticized U.S. spending to shore up Ukraine’s defenses, questioned current U.S. participation in the NATO military alliance, and once called Zelenskyy “perhaps the greatest salesman of any politician who has ever lived.” , alluding to the fact that the aid given to Ukraine was the result of the Ukrainian leader’s political skill, rather than the real needs of his country.

Taken together, Trump’s comments and emerging signs of trade nationalism have raised broader concerns that potential pressure from the White House or withdrawal of U.S. military support could coax resource-dependent kyiv into a diplomatic outcome involving territorial concessions to its invader.

Ukraine expects a meeting between Trump and Zelensky to take place soon after the US president-elect takes office, ministry spokesman Heorhii Tykhyi said on Friday, according to Reuters.