‘Not a single conscious Ukrainian in my circle would support Trump’s plan’published at 11:20 GMT
11:20 GMT
Joel Gunter
Reporting from Kyiv
President Trump is once again pressuring President Zelensky to accept a deal that many people here fear will benefit Russia and trample over Ukraine’s demands.
Trump said last night that Zelensky’s “people” love the deal the US is pushing, and implied that the Ukrainian president was the obstacle to peace.
Responding to Trump’s remarks today, Ukrainian civilians say they are sceptical about the US president’s agenda.
“There is not a single conscious Ukrainian in my personal circle who would support Trump’s peace plan,” says Yana Kolomiets, 31, a casting director from Odesa, which has been badly hit by Russian drone strikes.
“Our country was attacked, and now we have to accept all the rules, give up territories under our control and then reduce the size of our army?” she says. “The war must be ended, but not like this.”
On the whole, Trump is not being taken seriously here as someone with Ukraine’s best interests at heart.
He is “only interested in ticking another box on the list of wars he has ended, without understanding who is actually at fault”, says Iryna Dobrutska, a marketing worker in Kyiv.
For Ukrainians, the idea of giving up territory that Russia has been unable to capture on the battlefield is an emotional one, as is giving up sovereignty over the size of its army and other issues.
But Russia’s apparent advantage on the battlefield means that it is “not really interested in anything constructive”, says Maryna Stepanenko, a Ukrainian journalist.
“Ukraine, as always, will be forced to sign whatever is on the table,” she says.