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Charlie McCarthy(Newsmax)
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on former President Donald Trump to disclose his peace plan for ending the war with Russia instead of waiting for the outcome of the 2024 U.S. presidential election.
Trump, the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, has said he would be able to cut a “fair deal” with Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin within 24 hours to end the war.
Zelenskyy cautioned, though, that Ukraine would not be willing to surrender territory to the invaders.
“He [Trump] can publicly share his idea now, not waste time, not to lose people, and say, ‘My formula is to stop the war and stop all this tragedy and stop Russian aggression,'” Zelenskyy told CNN after his speech Tuesday at the United Nations General Assembly.
“And he said, how he sees it, how to push Russia from our land. Otherwise, he’s not presenting the global idea of peace.”
Zelenskyy added: “So [if] the idea is how to take the part of our territory and to give Putin, that is not the peace formula.”
During a Sunday interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Trump was asked whether his deal would allow Russia to keep Ukrainian land it had captured.
“No, no. I’d make a fair deal for everybody. Nope, I’d make it fair,” Trump said.
“You know, that’s something that could have been negotiated. Because there were certain parts, Crimea and other parts of the country, that a lot of people expected could happen. You could have made a deal. So they could have made a deal where there’s lesser territory right now than Russia’s already taken, to be honest.”
Zelenskyy is in the U.S. primarily to speak at the U.N., but he also planned to meet this week with President Joe Biden and members of Congress in Washington.
The Ukrainian president told CNN his country needs to obtain long-range missiles from the U.S. to support his forces’ counteroffensive.
“We are on the finishing line, I’m sure of that,” Zelenskyy said.
However, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., told reporters Tuesday that he would have serious questions for Zelenskyy before discussing additional aid to Ukraine in the future.
“Where’s the accountability on the money we already spent?” McCarthy said. “What is the plan for victory?”
McCarthy added that Russia’s unprovoked attack on Ukraine was an “atrocity,” and “we want to make sure that ends.”
“No matter the issue is, I want accountability for whatever the hard-working taxpayers spend their money on,” the speaker said, “and I want a plan for victory.”
Zelenskyy told CNN that Americans don’t understand what it’s like to be at war on their own land.
“It’s so difficult to understand when you are in war, and when you are not in war,” Zelenskyy said. “Even when you come to the war, to the country which is in war, when you come to one day, you can understand more than you live, you hear, you think, you read. No, you can’t compare. It’s different situation. That’s why I’m thinking we can’t compare these challenges.”
Charlie McCarthy ✉
Charlie McCarthy, a writer/editor at Newsmax, has nearly 40 years of experience covering news, sports, and politics.
