US President-elect Donald Trump is “strong and unpredictable,” and those qualities can be a decisive factor in his policy approach to💜 Russia's invasion of Ukraine, according to Ukrai♐nian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
However, Zelens🔯kyy said it won't be possible to end the almost three years of war ✨in one day, as Trump claimed during his election campaign he could do.
“The hot' stage of the war ca꧟n end quite quickly, if Trump is strong in h♚is position,” Zelensky said in a Ukrainian television interview late Thursday, referring to fighting on the battlefield.
“I believe (Trump) is strong and unpredictable. I would very𓄧 much like President Trump's unpredictability to be directed primarily towardꦕ the Russian Federation,” Zelenskyy said.
Trump, who takes office on Jan. 20, hasn't publicly fleshed out his policy on Ukraine b𒈔ut his previous comments have put a question mark over whethe꧙r the United States will continue to be Ukraine's biggest — and most important — military backer.
Zelenskyy is eager to guarantee that Washington's support keeps coming, and he met with Trump in New York ൲even before last November's US presidential el🌠ection.
With the war about to enter its fourth year next month, and with Trump coming to power, the question of how and when Europe's biggest conflict since World War II m🌱ight end has come to the fore.
Russia controls about one-fifth of Ukraine and last year capitalised on weaknesses in Ukraine's defences to slowly advance in eastern areas despit☂e high losses of troops and equipment. The war's trajectory is not in Ukraine's favour. The country is short-handed on the front ꦰline and needs continued support from its Western partners.
Trump responded favorably to the possibility raised by French President Emmanuel Macron of Western peacekeepers being deployed in Ukraine to oversee an agreement that stops the fighting, Zelenskyy said. He met with Trump and Macron in Paris last month.
“But I raised an issue, sayinജg we did𝓀n't hear what specific countries will join this initiative, and whether the US will be there,” Zelenskyy said.
𝔉The Ukrainian leader is determined for his country to become a NATO member. The alliance's 32 member countries say Ukraine will join one day, but not until the war ends.
“Tꦉhe deployment of European troops (to keep the peace in Ukraine) should not rule out Ukraine's future in NATO,” Zelenskyy said in the television interview.
Zelenskyy described the i🍷ncursion by Ukrainian forces into Russia's Kursk border region as a “very strong trump card” in any future peace negotiations.
In a bid to counter glum news from the front line, Ukraine seized 🧸part of Kursk last August in what was the first occupation of Russian territory since World War II.
But the incursion didn't significꦕantly change the dynamic of the war, and military analysts say Ukraine has lost some 40% of the land it initially captured.
Nevertheless, Zelenskyy said the achievement impressed countries in As♌ia, South America and Africa and tarnished Russia's militaryꦛ reputation.
