No contact with Trump – Kremlin
Russia has not held any talks with former US president and now GOP frontrunner Donald Trump about settling the Ukraine conflict, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday.
In recent months, Trump has on several occasions promised to bring an end to the fighting between the neighboring states – which is about to enter its third year – within just 24 hours if he gets back into the Oval Office.
He also claimed that he would be able to quickly end the crisis by sitting down with both Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin and exploiting what he called both their weaknesses and strengths. The ex-president also did not rule out the possibility that Ukraine might have to cede some territory to Russia in order to reach a peace deal.
Asked about what the Kremlin thought of Trump’s campaign promises to end the conflict, Peskov noted that Moscow “has no idea how this could be accomplished.” “There have been no contacts on this issue.”
Meanwhile, Zelensky also weighed in on Trump’s comments last week, admitting that his promise sounded “a little scary.” He noted that the former US leader did not provide any details about his initiative, and also expressed concern that potentially it could ignore Ukrainian interests.
Peskov and Zelensky’s comments come after Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on Sunday became the latest Republican presidential candidate to drop out of the White House race. DeSantis, who was widely seen as the 45th US president’s main rival in the GOP primary, has now publicly endorsed Trump.
The only GOP contender besides Trump still in the race remains Nikki Haley, who served in his administration as US ambassador to the UN, although she is trailing her former boss in polls.
Meanwhile, according to the Decision Desk HQ/The Hill polling aggregator, which takes into account numerous surveys, Trump leads incumbent Joe Biden by 1% in a potential 2024 re-match (44% vs. 43%). At the same time, a November New York Times/Siena poll found that Biden was trailing the GOP frontrunner in five out of six swing states.
