Trump turns screws on Zelensky heading into Jeddah talks
President Trump is inflicting mounting pain on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky ahead of planned talks in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, as U.S. officials look to secure concessions Trump can bring to Russian President Vladimir Putin for a peace deal.
The summit of top U.S. and Ukrainian envoys in Jeddah this week follows Zelensky’s explosive visit to the White House on Feb. 28, when Trump and Vice President Vance called the war-time leader ungrateful and unwilling to move toward a ceasefire.
In the 10 days since, Trump has suspended U.S. military aid to Ukraine, halted intelligence support for strikes on Russia, and talked about potentially deporting tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees who fled from the war.
Zelensky has consistently signaled Ukraine’s willingness to sign a mineral rights deal with the U.S. However, Trump said this weekend that the economic deal alone would not be enough to revive U.S. support for Ukraine’s military.
It is not clear whether Trump’s pressure has moved Ukraine and Russia any closer on the terms of a potential deal, as Russia ramps up aerial attacks on weakened Ukrainian defenses.
“It's pretty clear that the deal that Trump wants is unsustainable for Ukraine, so I don't know how much he will be able to get out of there,” said Eugene Finkel, the author of “Intent to Destroy: Russia’s Two-Hundred-Year Quest to Dominate Ukraine,” published last year.
Finkel, a political science professor at Johns Hopkins University, said Ukraine this week would likely agree to the “concepts of a deal”........
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