Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said he’d step down as president “immediately” if the the country achieved peace in its war with Russia or was given a NATO membership.
“If it’s about peace in Ukraine and you really want me to leave my position, I am ready to do that,” Zelensky said at a Kyiv press conference on Sunday. “Secondly, I can exchange it for NATO, if there is such an opportunity.”
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The Ukrainian president’s comment comes after President Donald Trump called him a “dictator without elections.”
“I love Ukraine, but Zelenskyy has done a terrible job, his Country is shattered, and MILLIONS have unnecessarily died,” Trump wrote to Truth Social last week.
Trump had also claimed Ukraine started its war with Russia and Zelensky’s approval rating was “down at four percent,” prompting Zelensky to accuse him of living in a “disinformation bubble.”
Zelensky on Sunday denied that he is after a power grab, saying that he is “focused on Ukraine’s security today and not in 20 years.”
“I don’t plan to be in power for decades,” he said. “Therefore, that’s my aim and my dream.”
On Friday, while sidestepping a question on if Russian President Vladimir Putin was a dictator, Trump said: “I think President Putin and President Zelensky are going to have to get together, because, you know what, we want to stop killing millions of people.”
Trump has pushed for returns from war-ridden Ukraine, as the White House proposed that the U.S. gets half the revenue from natural resources like minerals, gas and oil, according to documents reviewed by the New York Times.
During his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference this weekend, he called it “stupid” that the U.S. was getting nothing back from war investments.
