“What will Trump do if Vladimir Putin occupies a NATO country?” asks Volodymyr Zelensky

The Ukrainian leader reacted to the latest statements by former American President Donald Trump, who questions military support for Ukraine and the United States’ participation in NATO.

Surprise speaker at the World Economic Forum in Davos (Switzerland), Tuesday January 16, Volodymyr Zelensky increased his warnings concerning the temptation to “freeze” the conflict in Ukraine. The Ukrainian president also responded to criticism coming from the Republican camp in the United States, and more particularly from former President Donald Trump, the big favorite in the party’s primaries.

“Radical voices among Republicans are straining Ukrainian society”declared the Ukrainian president, in an exchange captured on by LCI journalist, Darius Rochebin. A growing part of the American right is calling for a reduction or even an end to the military support that the country provides to Ukraine. The new aid package for kyiv (costed at more than $100 billion) wanted by President Joe Biden is still blocked, due to lack of consensus in the American Congress.

“In war, words can kill”

“Risky slogans are part of the electoral context (…) but it hurts so much in Ukraine,” commented Volodymyr Zelensky, as the Republican primaries have just started across the Atlantic. “Words don’t always hurt. Sometimes in war, words can kill.”

On the sidelines of his intervention, the Ukrainian leader was asked what he would say to Donald Trump, if the latter were in the room. “I have to [de répondre] ?”he asked, thinking for a long moment before speaking again.

“Even if [Donald Trump] does not support us, I ask him to imagine an occupation of Ukraine by Vladimir Putin for some timelaunched the Ukrainian president. What will Trump do if, after Ukraine, [Vladimir Poutine] occupies a NATO country?. For Volodymyr Zelensky, Moscow will not stop its policy of invasion in Ukraine, as many Republicans maintain. “It’s bullshit”he reacted.

In July, interviewed by Fox News, Donald Trump promised that he would end the war in Ukraine “in one day”. “I would say to Zelensky: ‘Enough, you have to make a deal’the former president swore. And I would say to Putin: ‘If you don’t make a deal, we will give a lot [à l’Ukraine], more than we ever gave.” Enough to provoke the ire of Ukraine, which has refused since the start of the invasion any ceasefire negotiations, as long as Russia does not withdraw from its territory.

Donald Trump accused of abandoning Europe in the face of Russia

In a conversation dating from 2020, when he was still president of the United States, Donald Trump questioned American support for the European Union, according to European Commissioner Thierry Breton, present during these discussions, and cited by Politico. “You must understand that if Europe is attacked, we will never come to help and support you,” he told the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.

During his presidency, from 2016 to 2020, Donald Trump also made incendiary speeches. “NATO is dead, and we will leave, we will leave NATO”, for example, he announced in 2020 to Ursula von der Leyen, again according to Thierry Breton. In his latest speeches, the Republican candidate once again threatened to no longer participate in the alliance.

“European countries (…) took advantage of us commercially, then they took advantage of us on military protection”he judged, during a public interview organized on January 11 by the Fox News channel. As data site FiveThirtyEight shows, sAccording to the main American pollsters, Donald Trump has a strong chance of being nominated as the Republican Party’s candidate for the November presidential election.