Trump again accused Zelensky of derailing peace talks and expressed doubt that the U.S. will attend tomorrow’s meeting

U.S. President Donald Trump has once again accused Volodymyr Zelensky of being unwilling to make peace, saying that the only remaining opponent of the U.S.-proposed peace plan is the Ukrainian president himself.

He said this yesterday while answering journalists’ questions in the Oval Office.

According to Trump, negotiations on a deal were close both with Moscow and with Kyiv, and the concept of the agreement itself enjoyed broad support. It envisions a “division of territory.”

“I thought we were very close to concluding an agreement with Russia. I thought we were very close to concluding an agreement with Ukraine — in fact, apart from President Zelensky, his people liked the concept of the deal. You know, we proposed something. It’s four or five different points, a little complicated, because you’re dividing land in a certain way — it’s not easy. It’s like a complicated real-estate deal multiplied by a thousand, right? But it’s a deal that would stop thousands of people from being killed every month,” Trump said.

He once again repeated that if the war in Ukraine is not stopped, it could escalate into a third world war.

“These things end in World War Three. And I said this the other day, I said, you know, everyone keeps playing these games. You’ll end up with World War Three. And we don’t want that to happen,” the U.S. president stressed.

He also said that a meeting of American and European politicians dedicated to Ukraine is scheduled for Saturday. But, according to Trump, the U.S. has not yet decided whether to attend.

“We’ll attend if we decide there’s a good chance [to end the war in Ukraine]. We don’t want to waste a lot of time… We’ll see whether we attend the meeting or not,” Trump said.

Earlier, he had already spoken about Kyiv’s territorial losses, though in different terms—saying that Ukraine would inevitably lose the remaining parts of Donbas “if not as part of a peace agreement, then on the battlefield.”