US troops won’t be sent to help defend Ukraine, Trump says

Washington – President Donald Trump offered his assurances on Tuesday that American troops would not be sent to help defend Ukraine against Russia after seeing the day before.

Trump also declared in a morning television interview that Ukraine’s hopes to join NATO and find the Crimean Peninsula in Russia are “impossible”.

The republican president, the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other European leaders had hours of talks at the White House on Monday aimed at ending the Russian war against Ukraine. While answering journalists’ questions, Trump has not excluded the sending of American troops to participate in an effort led by Europe to defend Ukraine as part of the security guarantees sought by Zelenskyy.

Trump said after his meeting in Alaska last week with Russian President Vladimir Putin that Putin was open to the idea of security guarantees for Ukraine.

But asked on Tuesday on “Fox of Fox News Channel & Friends “What assured that he could provide in the future and beyond his mandate that American troops would not be part of the defense of the border of Ukraine, Trump said:” Well, you have my insurance and I am president. »»

Trump would have no control over the US military after the end of his mandate in January 2029.

The White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Tuesday that “American boots will not be on the ground” as part of a potential peacekeeping mission.

The president also declared in the interview that it was optimistic that an agreement can be concluded to put an end to the Russian invasion, but he stressed that Ukraine will have to put aside his hope of recovering Crimea, which was seized by the Russian forces in 2014 and his long -term aspirations to join the OTAT military alliance.

“These two things are impossible,” said Trump.

Putin, as part of any potential agreement to withdraw her Ukraine forces, seeks the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, as well as the recognition of Crimea as Russian territory.

Trump said on Monday that he organized direct talks between Putin and Zelenskyy.

But the Kremlin has not yet said if Putin, who resisted the previous calls of Trump and others for direct negotiations on the end of the war, is committed to a face -to -face meeting with the Ukrainian chief.

When he was asked if Putin had promised Trump that he ended up directly with the Ukrainian chief Leavitt responded affirmatively. “He did it,” said Leavitt about Putin.

Trump, early Monday during interviews with Zelenskyy and European leaders, said that he was pressuring for three discussions between Zelenskyy, Putin and himself.

But after talking to Putin later in the day, Trump said that he first organized a face to face between Zelenskyy and Putin and that the three -party talks would follow if necessary.

“It was an idea that evolved during the president’s conversations with President Putin, President Zelensky and European leaders yesterday,” Leavitt said.

But when he discussed a telephone call held after the meeting between Trump and the Russian chief, Putin’s foreign adviser Yuri Ushakov, gave no indication that a bilateral or trilateral meeting with Ukraine had been agreed.

Trump said he thought Putin’s driving line would become clear in the coming weeks.

“I think Putin is tired,” said Trump. “I think they are all tired. But you never know it. We will discover President Putin in the coming weeks. That I can tell you. “