Trump is positive ahead of meeting Putin regarding Ukraine war
US President Donald Trump is set to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin on August 15th, and has declared that he’ll know “within the first two minutes” whether they will be able to agree on a deal to end the war in Ukraine, as reported by Africa News via AP.
Trump spoke to reporters in the White House, and in regards to the meeting, said “I think it’ll be good, but it might be bad.” He also added that he hoped to obtain a ceasefire “very quickly.”
He also confirmed that he wishes to organise a meeting between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He stated that he would “ultimately… put the two of them in a room,” and that he would either be there or not. He hypothesised that the situation would be solved after such a meeting. However, similar proposals to this have so far been rejected by Putin.
Trump anticipates normalised trade relations between the US and Russia, on the assumption of if the meeting goes well. This would be a reversal of recent decisions he has made, where he has applied strategic pressure on other countries doing the same as he anticipates to do. US tariff rates were doubled on Indian goods via an executive order signed by Trump on August 6th, simply due to the fact that India had purchased Russian Federation oil. This saw one of the most steepened charges on a US trading partner, and caused tension between India and the US.
READ: Martin Jay: Can Trump be trusted to keep his Sahara promise?
Trump has been communicating with European leaders regarding a potential meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy. On August 10th, he was asked by German chancellor Freidrich Merz to join an emergency virtual meeting with the intention of persuading Trump to protect Ukrainian interests ahead of his meeting with Putin.
The meeting was joined by Zelenskyy and other European leaders. Trump said he is going to get “everybody’s ideas.” However, neither Ukraine nor European leaders have been invited to take part in the US-Russia summit. Ukraine and European allies disagree with the idea that Putin should lay claim to any territory if he doesn’t agree to a ceasefire first.
Africa News via AP, Maghrebi.org
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