An unprecedented historic meeting between Trump and Zelensky and an escalation that predicts a major war

Department of Research, Studies and International News 01-03-2025

After a tumultuous meeting, Trump rules out another meeting with Zelensky

US President Donald Trump ruled out any chance of immediate in-person talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky after their tense shouting match at the White House on Friday.

“Well, he says he wants it now. He wants to come back right now. But I can’t do that,” Trump told reporters on Friday evening as he was leaving the White House to spend the weekend in Florida.

Meanwhile, in an interview with Fox News on Friday night, Zelensky repeatedly said he would not apologize to Trump for the unexpected blowup between the two sides.

“I think that we have to be very open and very honest, and I’m not sure that we did something bad,” he said.

But he noted that this kind of spat “is not good for both sides.”

Earlier in the day, a press conference at the White House where Trump and Zelensky were scheduled to sign the U.S.-Ukraine minerals deal was canceled, following the stunning clash between the two inside the Oval Office which ended with Zelensky leaving the meeting.

Shortly after the chaotic confrontation, Trump posted a statement on Truth Social, saying: “I have determined that President Zelenskyy is not ready for Peace if America is involved, because he feels our involvement gives him a big advantage in negotiations. I don’t want advantage, I want PEACE. He disrespected the United States of America in its cherished Oval Office. He can come back when he is ready for Peace.”

For his part, Zelensky took to social media platform X and posted: “Thank you America, thank you for your support, thank you for this visit. Thank you (President Trump), Congress, and the American people. Ukraine needs just and lasting peace, and we are working exactly for that.”

Citing a White House official, media reported that Trump currently is not interested in revisiting or reviving the minerals deal.

Zelensky leaves White House without signing minerals deal after shouting match

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was asked to leave the White House after a chaotic Oval Office confrontation with US President Donald Trump on Friday, and the signing of a minerals deal between the two sides was called off.

Following the tense shouting match in the Oval Office earlier in the day, Trump said that he wants an “immediate” ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine, and that he believes his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin is ready for a peace deal.

Trump warned Zelensky to make peace or lose American support.

“I have determined that President Zelenskyy is not ready for Peace if America is involved, because he feels our involvement gives him a big advantage in negotiations. I don’t want advantage, I want PEACE. He disrespected the United States of America in its cherished Oval Office. He can come back when he is ready for Peace,” Trump posted a statement on the social platform Truth Social.

Zelensky said in a Fox News interview that Ukraine won’t enter peace talks with Russia until it has security guarantees against another offensive.

After a spat with US Vice-President JD Vance in the Oval Office, who demanded the Ukrainian leader be thankful for Trump’s effort to get his country out of its three-year conflict with Russia, Zelensky wrote on the social platform X: “Thank you America, thank you for your support, thank you for this visit. Thank you (President Trump), Congress, and the American people. Ukraine needs just and lasting peace, and we are working exactly for that.”

What should have been a normal press pool spray before the high-stakes Trump-Zelensky bilateral meeting transpired into a fireworks-filled blowup aired on TV that no one would expect, all starting with an interjection by Vance.

“You should be thanking the president for trying to bring an end to this conflict,” Vance told Zelensky during the unprecedented public confrontation, which later saw the three of them — Trump and Vance versus Zelensky — repeatedly race to talk over one another.

Zelensky meeting at White House erupts into heated dispute

A White House meeting between US President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday — which was expected to produce an agreement over rare earth minerals as a condition for ending Ukraine’s three-year military conflict with Russia — turned dramatically contentious with no deal reached as video of the clash reverberated around the globe.

The last 10 minutes of the nearly 45-minute meeting deteriorated into a tense back and forth between Trump, Vice-President JD Vance and Zelensky, who expressed skepticism about Russia’s commitment to diplomacy.

“Let me tell you, you don’t have the cards,” Trump said. “With us, you have the cards — but without us, you don’t have any cards.

“You’re gambling with World War III, and what you’re doing is very disrespectful to the country, this country that’s backed you far more than a lot of people say they should have,” Trump told Zelensky.

“You’re either going to make a deal or we’re out,” Trump said. “And if we’re out, you’ll fight it out and I don’t think it’s going to be pretty.”

Vance told Zelensky: “Mr. President, with respect, I think it’s disrespectful for you to come to the Oval Office to try to litigate this in front of the American media.”

Trump said Zelensky’s “hatred” for Russian President Vladimir Putin was a roadblock to a diplomatic solution.

“You see the hatred he’s got for Putin,” Trump said. “That’s very tough for me to make a deal with that kind of hate.”

The Ukrainian leader was asked to leave the White House by top Trump advisers shortly after the US president yelled at him.

Trump later told reporters, shortly before leaving for his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida for the weekend, that he wanted an “immediate cease-fire” between Russia and Ukraine but expressed doubt that Zelensky was ready to make peace.

Zelensky, who engaged in the dispute entirely in English, made an appearance on Fox News on Friday evening in which he said his public disagreement with Trump and Vance was “not good for both sides”.

But Zelensky said that the US president — who maintained that Putin is ready to end the war — should understand that Ukraine can’t change its stance toward Russia so quickly.

Zelensky said that Ukraine won’t engage in peace talks with Russia until it has security guarantees.

“It’s so sensitive for our people,” Zelensky said. “And they just want to hear that America (is) on our side, that America will stay with us. Not with Russia, with us. That’s it.”

Following the meeting, Trump posted on his social media site that he had “determined” that Zelensky “is not ready for Peace”.

“He disrespected the United States of America in its cherished Oval Office. He can come back when he is ready for Peace,” Trump wrote.

The prospects for the minerals deal were uncertain. A Trump administration official said later on Friday that all American aid to Ukraine could be canceled soon, The New York Times reported.

The Oval Office clash further opened the divide in US politics, with some Democrats suggesting Zelensky was set up by Trump and Vance in the meeting.

“Trump and Vance are doing Putin’s dirty work,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said.

Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland said, “They’re popping champagne in the Kremlin.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, said: “Thanks to President Trump, the days of America being taken advantage of and disrespected are over. What we witnessed in the Oval Office today was an American president putting America first.”

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni proposed “an immediate summit” between the United States and European allies “to speak frankly about how we intend to face today’s great challenges, starting with Ukraine”.