World
Trump and Zelenskiy clash, leaving Ukraine exposed in war with Russia

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s meeting with Donald Trump ended in disaster on Friday, after the two leaders clashed in an extraordinary exchange before the world’s media at the White House over the war with Russia.
Zelenskiy had seen the meeting in the Oval Office as an opportunity to convince the United States not to side with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who ordered the invasion of Ukraine three years ago, Reuters reported.
Instead U.S. President Trump and Vice President JD Vance laid into Zelenskiy, saying he showed disrespect, driving relations with Kyiv’s most important wartime ally to a new low. The Ukrainian leader was told to leave, a U.S. official said.
An agreement between Ukraine and the United States to jointly develop Ukraine’s rich natural resources, which Kyiv and its European allies had hoped would usher in better relations, was left unsigned and in limbo.
European leaders leapt to Zelenskiy’s defense. German chancellor candidate Friedrich Merz said “we must never confuse aggressor and victim in this terrible war.”
Zelenskiy spoke by telephone with French President Emmanuel Macron, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and EU Council President Antonio Costa, an official in the Ukrainian delegation in Washington told Reuters.
Britain is due to host a meeting of Europe’s leaders and Zelenskiy on Sunday to discuss a security backstop to any peace agreement between Moscow and Kyiv.
Trump has lurched toward Russia since taking over as president, shocking traditional allies in Europe and beyond and leaving Ukraine increasingly vulnerable. Friday’s outburst was the most public display of that shift.
The already-tense meeting blew up when Vance stressed the need for diplomacy to resolve the biggest conflict in Europe since World War Two. Zelenskiy, his arms folded, countered that Putin could not be trusted and noted that Vance had never visited Ukraine.
“What kind of diplomacy are you talking about, JD?” Zelenskiy asked after recounting failed diplomatic efforts with Russia.
“I’m talking about the kind of diplomacy that’s going to end the destruction of your country,” Vance shot back.
Zelenskiy openly challenged Trump over his softer approach toward Putin, urging him to “make no compromises with a killer.”
Trump, whose team said he and Vance were “standing up for Americans,” quickly took to Truth Social after the meeting to accuse Zelenskiy of disrespecting the United States.
“I have determined that President Zelenskyy is not ready for Peace if America is involved,” he wrote, using an alternative spelling of the leader’s name. “He can come back when he is ready for Peace.”
Trump later told reporters as he left the White House for a weekend at his Florida home that Zelenskiy needs to realize he is losing the war.
“What he’s got to say is, ‘I want to make peace.’ He doesn’t have to stand there and say ‘Putin this, Putin that,’ all negative things. He’s got to say, ‘I want to make peace.’ I don’t want to fight a war anymore,” Trump said.
Zelenskiy, asked during an interview by Fox News if his relationship with Trump could be salvaged after Friday’s eruption, said, “Yes of course” and appeared to express some regret, adding “I’m sorry for this.”
The head of the Ukrainian armed forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, posted a statement on Telegram affirming that his troops stood by Zelenskiy and that Ukraine’s strength was in its unity.
Anxious Ukrainians following from afar largely rallied around their leader but fretted about the prospects of continuing flows of U.S. military aid that the country has relied on.
In Congress, reaction from Trump’s Republican Party was mixed, while Democrats lambasted his handling of the meeting.
The Ukrainian leader conducted the meeting in his non-native English, and as it progressed he was drowned out by Trump and Vance.
“You’re not in a good position. You don’t have the cards right now. With us, you start having cards,” Trump said.
“I’m not playing cards, I’m very serious, Mr. President,” Zelenskiy said.
“You’re playing cards. You’re gambling with the lives of millions of people, you’re gambling with World War Three,” the U.S. president continued.
Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev appeared to revel in the spectacle, writing on Telegram that the Ukrainian leader had received a “brutal dressing down.”
EARLY EXIT
After the talks, Trump directed two top aides to tell Zelenskiy it was time to leave, even as attendants were preparing to serve lunch to the delegations, according to a White House official.
The Ukrainians were instructed to depart despite their desire to continue the talks, the official added.
The falling-out meant that Ukraine and the United States failed to sign a much-vaunted minerals deal that Kyiv hoped would spur Trump to back Ukraine’s war effort and potentially win support from Republicans in Congress for a new round of aid.
Trump is not interested in revisiting the minerals deal at the moment, a senior White House official told Reuters on Friday evening.
The clash also undermined efforts by European leaders to convince Trump to provide security guarantees for Ukraine even if he has refused to deploy U.S. soldiers on Ukrainian soil to maintain peace. Such guarantees are seen as crucial to deter Russia from future aggression.
Trump instead threatened to withdraw U.S. support from Ukraine.
“You’re either going to make a deal, or we’re out, and if we’re out, you’ll fight it out. I don’t think it’s going to be pretty,” Trump told Zelenskiy.
“Once we sign that deal, you’re in a much better position. But you’re not acting at all thankful, and that’s not a nice thing. I’ll be honest. That’s not a nice thing.”
Trump stressed that Putin wants to make a deal.
Vance also interjected that it was disrespectful of Zelenskiy to come to the Oval Office to litigate his position, a point Trump agreed with.
“You didn’t say thank you,” Vance said. Zelenskiy, raising his voice, responded: “I said a lot of times thank you to American people.”
Zelenskiy, who won billions of dollars of U.S. weaponry and moral support from the Biden administration, is facing a sharply different attitude from Trump. Trump wants to quickly wind down the three-year war, improve ties with Russia and recoup money spent to support Ukraine.
“I hope I’m going to be remembered as a peacemaker,” Trump said.
Earlier, Trump told Zelenskiy that his soldiers have been unbelievably brave and that the United States wants to see an end to the fighting and the money put to “different kinds of use like rebuilding.”
Ukraine has rapidly expanded its defense industry production but remains heavily reliant on foreign military assistance, while also struggling to replenish manpower as it battles a much larger foe.
While Ukraine repelled Russia’s invasion from the outskirts of Kyiv and recaptured swathes of territory in 2022, Russia still controls around a fifth of Ukraine and has been slowly taking ground since a failed Ukrainian counteroffensive in 2023.
Kyiv’s troops hold a chunk of land in Russia’s western Kursk region after a 2024 incursion.
Trump has engaged in a long-distance feud with Zelenskiy in recent weeks, criticizing his handling of the war, calling him a “dictator” and urging him to agree to the minerals deal. He subsequently distanced himself from the “dictator” remark.
World
Trump says Ukraine talks may be going OK, but there is a time ‘to put up or shut up’
Trump has shown signs of losing patience and has spoken of imposing secondary sanctions on countries that buy Russian oil if he feels Moscow is dragging its feet on a deal.

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Saturday that talks aimed at ending the war in Ukraine may be going OK, but “there’s a point at which you just have to either put up or shut up.”
Trump made the comment to reporters a day after he showed frustration with Russia and told it to “get moving” on reaching a deal.
“I think Ukraine-Russia might be going OK, and you’re going to be finding out pretty soon,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One, while adding:
“There’s a point at which you just have to either put up or shut up and we’ll see what happens, but I think it’s going fine.”
On Friday, Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff held talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin about the search for a peace deal.
The talks came at a time when U.S.-Russia dialogue aimed at agreeing a ceasefire ahead of a possible peace deal to end the war appeared to have stalled over disagreements around conditions for a full pause in hostilities.
Trump has shown signs of losing patience and has spoken of imposing secondary sanctions on countries that buy Russian oil if he feels Moscow is dragging its feet on a deal.
Earlier on Saturday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov praised Trump for what he said was a better understanding of the Ukraine conflict than any other Western leader.
“When we speak about eliminating root causes of any conflict, including the Ukrainian conflict, this is the only way to resolve the problem and to establish long-lasting peace. Remove root causes,” Lavrov said at the Antalya Diplomacy Forum in southern Turkey.
“President Trump was the first and so far, I think, almost the only one among the Western leaders who repeatedly, with conviction, several times stated that it was a huge mistake to pull Ukraine into NATO. And this is one of the root causes which we quoted so many times.”
Putin, who launched Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, has long cast Ukraine’s tilt to the West, including its desire to join NATO, as a threat to Russia.
Commenting on an agreement between Ukraine and Russia to pause strikes on each other’s energy facilities, Lavrov said that Moscow has been keeping its word and accused Kyiv of striking Russian energy infrastructure almost every day.
“I gave to our colleagues from Turkey, to (Foreign) Minister (Hakan) Fidan, what we gave to the Americans, to the U.N., to the OSCE – the list of facts listing the attacks by Ukraine during the last three weeks against Russian energy infrastructure.”
Ukraine has made similar accusations against Russia since the U.S.-backed moratorium was approved.
World
White House says ‘all hell to pay’ should Iran develop nuclear weapon

President Donald Trump wants Iran to know that there will be “all hell to pay” if it does not abandon its nuclear program, his press secretary told reporters on Friday ahead of talks on Saturday between U.S. and Iranian delegations.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump’s “ultimate objective is to ensure that Iran can never obtain a nuclear weapon” and that Trump believes in diplomacy, but that “all options are on the table” if diplomatic efforts fail, Reuters reported.
“But he’s made it very clear to the Iranians, and his national security team will as well, that all options are on the table, and Iran has a choice to make. You can agree to President Trump’s demand, or there will be all hell to pay, and that’s how the president feels. He feels very strongly about it,” Leavitt said.
U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff is set for talks on Saturday with an Iranian delegation in Oman. Iranian state media said Iran would be represented by Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, with Omani Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi as intermediary.
Trump in February restored his “maximum pressure” campaign on Iran, which includes efforts to drive its oil exports down to zero, in order to stop Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. He said earlier this week that if the talks are unsuccessful, “Iran is going to be in great danger.”
World
Tourist helicopter crashes into New York’s Hudson River, killing all six aboard
Agustin Escobar, an executive at Germany-based technology company Siemens was among those killed according to the New York Times, which cited unnamed law enforcement sources, Reuters reported.

A tourist helicopter plummeted upside down into New York City’s Hudson River on Thursday killing all six people on board, including a Spanish family with three children and the pilot, Mayor Eric Adams said.
Agustin Escobar, an executive at Germany-based technology company Siemens was among those killed according to the New York Times, which cited unnamed law enforcement sources, Reuters reported.
New York City police referred requests for confirmation that Escobar was aboard the helicopter to the U.S. Coast Guard. The Coast Guard said in a statement that it did not yet have the names of the victims. Siemens did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside normal business hours.
Video of the crash showed what appeared to be a large object plunging into the river, followed seconds later by what appeared to be a helicopter blade. Afterwards, emergency and police boats were seen circling around a patch of river where the helicopter was submerged, with only what appeared to be the aircraft’s landing gear poking above the water’s surface.
The Bell 206 chopper, operated by New York Helicopter Tours, departed at about 3 p.m. ET (1900 GMT) from a downtown helicopter pad and flew north over the Hudson River, New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said.
It turned south when it reached the George Washington Bridge and crashed minutes later, hitting the water upside down and getting submerged near Lower Manhattan at around 3:15 p.m., just off Hoboken, New Jersey, Tisch added.
Divers helped remove the victims from the water. Four were pronounced dead at the scene, while two others were taken to area hospitals where they died.
The airspace around Manhattan is crowded with helicopters offering tourists a bird’s-eye view of the sights, with at least two dozen operators listed on tour website Viator. Many of the operators also offer helicopter shuttle services to the area airports.
New York Helicopter Tours, which offers sightseeing flights for as little as $114 per person on its website, did not respond immediately to a request for comment about the crash.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the tour helicopter was in Special Flight Rules Area established in New York that means no air traffic control services were being provided when it crashed.
The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate, with the NTSB leading the investigation.
Duffy said the FAA was also launching a Safety Review Team on Thursday evening. NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy and a team from the board will arrive in New York later on Thursday and plan to hold a press briefing on Friday.
New York City has a history of accidents involving helicopters. In 2018, five passengers aboard a helicopter died when it crashed into the East River, while the pilot survived. The helicopter was on a charter flight that featured an open door to allow passengers to take photographs of the skyline.
A New York City Police spokesperson said that police boats had assisted in Thursday’s rescue efforts.
Helicopter safety has been a topic of discussion in the U.S. Congress after 67 people were killed in a crash between an American Airlines regional jet and Army helicopter on Jan. 29 near Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C. The FAA has since permanently restricted helicopter traffic near that airport and is reviewing helicopter operations near other major airports.
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