Washington – President Trump attacked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “dictator without elections”, echoing the Kremlin rhetoric on war in Ukraine and climbing a public feud between the two leaders.
In a Posted on social truth On Wednesday, Mr. Trump went out to Zelenskyy, accusing him of making known the United States to provide billions of help to Ukraine and misuse it.
“Think -— a successfully successful comic, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, spoke of the United States of America when spending $ 350 million of dollars, to enter a war that could not be won, that never had to start , but a war that he, without him the United States and “Trump” will never be able to establish, “Trump wrote.
Trump inflated the amount of assistance the United States has sent to Ukraine since the invasion of Russia in 2022. The United States has provided $ 66 million in security assistance. In total, Congress has appropriated $ 175 million in financial, humanitarian and military aid in Ukraine.
“He refuses to have elections, he is very low in Ukrainian polls, and the only thing was good was to play Biden ‘as a fiddle’, Trump wrote.” A dictator without elections, Zelenskyy moves quickly quickly or not. It will have a country. “
Zelenskyy was elected President of Ukraine in 2019 with 73% of the votes. The country has delayed the election scheduled for early 2024 due to the war with Russia. A recent Public opinion survey In Ukraine he showed that 57% of Ukrainians said they trust Zelenskyy, as opposed to 37% who said no.
A senior administration official told CBS News that Mr. Trump’s attack on Zelenskyy was a direct response to Ukrainian President who said that Mr. Trump seemed to work in a Russian creation “disinformation space. “”
“We are seeing a lot of misinformation and this comes from Russia,” Zelenskyy said on Wednesday. “Unfortunately, President Trump, with all respect … lives in this space of misinformation.”
Zelenskyy’s comment came a day after Mr. Trump blamed Ukraine to begin the war with Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a large -scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 claimant Ukraine was directed by “neo -Nazis” representing a threat to Russia and its neighbors.
North -American and Russian officials gathered in Saudi Arabia earlier this week as to the war. Ukrainian officials were not included in the meeting.
At Capitol Hill, several Republican senators did not agree with Mr. Trump’s criticism in Zelenskyy. Senator Lisa Murkowski, from Alaska, said that “he would never refer to President Zelenskyy as his dictator.” Senator Susan Collins, from Maine, said that Zelenskyy does not blame Russia’s invasion “in any way.”
“To equate anyone or suggest that anyone in Ukraine has a responsibility for this war, forget the fact that Putin lied,” said Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina. “He has lied to all the steps of the road and I think any resolution in Ukraine that makes him feel like winning or simply pulling to a tie is a bad idea.”
Mike Pence, who acted as Vice President of Mr. Trump during his first term, also spoke against the president’s comments, sharing a Fox News article on February 24, 2022, with the headline “Russia invades Ukraine in a European attack. Great since World War II. ”
“Mr. President, Ukraine did not” start “this war, Pence write. “Russia launched a brutal and brutal invasion calling for hundreds of thousands of lives. The path to peace must be built on the truth.”
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