By Max Hunder
KYIV (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump could fulfil his promise to end the war in Ukraine, but only if he includes Kyiv in any talks, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Saturday.
Zelenskiy also said the terms of any deal that might arise under Trump were still unclear – and might not even be clear to Trump himself – because Russian President Vladimir Putin had no interest in ending the war.
Trump, who took office on Monday, promised during his election campaign to end the war within his first 24 hours in the White House, without saying how. Aides have since suggested that a deal could take months.
Ending the war would not be possible unless Trump includes Ukraine itself in any negotiations, Zelenskiy told reporters alongside Moldova’s president, Maia Sandu, a visiting ally.
“Otherwise it will not work. Because Russia does not want to end the war, while Ukraine wants to end it,” he said.
In a separate interview broadcast later on Saturday, Zelenskiy said he believed Trump truly wanted to see an end to the war, nearing the three-year mark next month.
“For now, we don’t know how this will happen because we don’t know the details,” Zelenskiy told Italian journalist Cecilia Sala, who was released this month after being detained for 21 days in Iran.
“I believe President Trump himself does not know all the details. Because I would say so much depends on what sort of just peace we can achieve. And whether Putin wants, in principle, to stop the war. I believe he doesn’t want to.”
Trump, he said, understood all the challenges associated with the peace process “and he is simply saying this has to end or it will get worse.”
Trump has expressed willingness to speak to Putin about ending the war, a contrast with the outgoing administration of Joe Biden, who shunned the Russian leader.
Kyiv, long worried about the prospect of its fate being decided by bigger powers without its participation, has said it is working to arrange a meeting between Zelenskiy and Trump.
Addressing journalists earlier alongside Sandu, Zelenskiy said he believed European allies should also be included in any future peace talks.
“As for what the set-up of the talks will be: Ukraine, I really hope Ukraine will be there, America, Europe and the Russians,” Zelenskiy said.
“Yes, I would really want that Europe would take part, because we will be members of the European Union,” he said. Ukraine and Moldova both submitted applications to join the EU days after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.
On Friday, Putin said he would like to meet Trump to talk about Ukraine. He cited a 2022 decree from Zelenskiy barring talks with Putin as a barrier to negotiations.
Zelenskiy said on Saturday he had introduced this ban to stop Putin from forming channels of communication with other groups in Ukraine, which he said Russia had attempted, particularly those advocating separatist views.
“I therefore took an absolutely fair decision,” he said. “I am the president of Ukraine and the leader of these or any other talks and I banned all the others.”
Zelenskiy also said Ukraine was ready to offer coal to Moldova, which is gripped by an energy crisis after flows of Russian gas through Ukraine stopped in the new year. Moldova accuses Moscow of refusing to send gas by other routes.
“Russia’s latest move has been to orchestrate an energy crisis,” Sandu told reporters.
She said energy prices had shot up in areas controlled by her government, and the situation was worse in a region held by pro-Russian separatists who relied on Russian energy and were subject to daily power cuts.
Sandu said this was part of a calculated Russian strategy to sow chaos in Moldova and bring a pro-Russian government to power in Moldova.
(Reporting by Max Hunder in Kyiv, Additional reporting by Alexander Tanas in ChisinauEditing by Ron Popeski, William Maclean, Peter Graff and Matthew Lewis)
