Trump visited the Ukrainian President yesterday. The tycoon seems to have moderated his tone on sending missiles to Kiev, meanwhile Orban prepares the summit in Budapest
The feeling of deja vu it was very strong when Volodymyr Zelensky he showed up at the White House yesterday. The American president was waiting for him Donald Trumpfor a third visit by the Ukrainian President to the US capital which was severely disrupted by Thursday evening’s phone call between Vladimir Putin and the American President.
In fact, the telephone conversation seems to have postponed the sending of Tomahawk missiles to Kiev and instead has reinvigorated the negotiations after the substantial failure of the Anchorage summit last August 15th.
Zelensky visits Trump
The two leaders then welcomed the press into the Cabinet Room of the White House, with President Trump immediately striking a cautious tone on the issue highlight of Tomahawk missiles. “We will talk about it,” the president said when asked about the issue. «It’s an escalation, but we’ll discuss it, we’d much rather they didn’t need it and the war ended, to be honest».
His words reflected a much more cautious position compared to the previous days, when he had openly raised the possibility of supplying weapons to Kiev. Trump also underlined that «we need Tomahawks too. We have many, but we need them. We cannot run out of resources for our country».
Zelensky, now a veteran when it comes to meetings with Trump, tried to maintain an optimistic approach, saying: “I think we can end this war with the president’s help.” On the question of joining NATO, the Ukrainian leader partially glossed over, but confirmed the your country’s iron stance on the need to “have security guarantees”, an eventuality so far vigorously rejected by Russia.
Returning to the missiles, a definitive answer to their sending has not been provided. On the other hand, as reported yesterday by CNN, in the telephone conversation between Putin and Trump the latter did not rule out the possibility of sending the Tomahawks to Kiev, although he moderated the tone of his statements. An approach also confirmed in yesterday’s statements.
The central theme of yesterday’s visit therefore became the Trump-Putin conversation, with the American President stating how the leaders of Russia, Ukraine and the United States «they must come together» to end the war.
Zelensky then insisted that Russia is not achieving many successes on the battlefield, trying to convince Trump that Kiev deserves more support.
The feeling of deja vu she was therefore also confirmed in the positions of the two leaderswith a Trump who appeared reluctant to follow the path of escalation (such as the delivery of the Tomahawks) and a Zelensky who was upright on Kiev’s security needs and needs for war material. It is therefore not clear at the moment what has really changed.
Orban prepares the summit
In Europe, meanwhile, Viktor Orban was able to rejoice yesterday, stating that «Budapest is the only location in Europe suitable for a peace summit between the United States and Russia. With long-standing peace leadership and trusted partnerships, we provide a reliable, secure and politically stable environment. There was no other choice.”
On the momentum of the Trump conversation-Putin, the Hungarian Prime Minister, spoke to the Russian President yesterdayin order to confirm his country’s willingness to organize the summit between the two leaders.
According to the report of the phone call provided by the Kremlin, Putin updated the Hungarian prime minister on the topics of the phone call with Trump. In short, diplomacy is once again in turmoil.
A few hours later, the Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto made his rounds of phone calls, hearing from both the US Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau that the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
For Budapest, this high-level summit would be a major diplomatic victory. Hungary has in fact been systematically ostracized within the European Union for its “pro-peace” position (better defined as “pro-Russian”), as well as for its strong disagreements with Kiev, not least over the latter’s entry into the EU.
