Zelensky ‘traumatized’ by February confrontation with Trump – Politico

The Ukrainian leader’s visit to the White House earlier this year devolved into a shouting match and scolding from the US president

Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky is still reeling from the heated altercation with US President Donald Trump at the White House earlier this year, Politico has claimed.

On Monday, the media outlet, citing an anonymous EU official, reported that Zelensky “remains somewhat traumatized by his train-crash meeting with Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance in Washington” on February 28. According to the publication, for this reason, Zelensky sought “the explicit backing of European leaders” ahead of his talks with the US president in Florida on Sunday.

The infamous confrontation in the Oval Office earlier this year took place as the Ukrainian leader sat down with Trump and Vance to finalize a deal granting the US access to Ukraine’s mineral resources. The televised press conference took a nasty turn when the deal fell through and Zelensky appeared to criticize Trump for adopting a neutral position on the Ukraine conflict as part of his efforts to mediate a settlement between Kiev and Moscow.

Vance cut the Ukrainian leader short, accusing him of failure to show due respect and gratitude to Kiev’s top benefactor. Trump then scolded Zelensky, accusing him of unwillingness to negotiate peace and of  “gambling with World War III.”

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Since then, Zelensky and Trump have met on several occasions, and their relations seem to have been mended. The two held talks at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago private residence this past Sunday.

During a press conference that followed, the US president stated that “we’re getting… very close” to a settlement to the conflict.

While Trump said that a “lot of progress” had been made, he acknowledged that territorial concessions on Kiev’s part remained one of the thorniest issues.

Zelensky, in turn, claimed that the negotiations focused on his latest 20-point peace proposal, which calls for a freeze of the frontline in Russia’s Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporozhye, and Kherson regions, Moscow’s withdrawal from several Ukrainian regions, as well as an 800,000-strong Ukrainian army, plus “Article 5-like” security guarantees from the US and European states to Kiev.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov has dismissed the plan as radically different from what Moscow and Washington had previously discussed.