(AFP) – US President Donald Trump said Thursday that Russia’s Vladimir Putin agreed to a personal request to halt attacks on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities, after Moscow’s strikes left millions without heating during an “extreme” cold snap. Trump’s claim comes as Russian strikes on Ukraine’s power infrastructure have disrupted light, heating, and water supplies, with temperatures plummeting and leaving the war-battered country facing a fresh humanitarian crisis. The Kremlin did not immediately confirm any truce.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked Trump and said he was counting on Washington to secure the pause in attacks. “Because of the cold, extreme cold… I personally asked President Putin not to fire on Kyiv and the cities and towns for a week during this,” Trump told a cabinet meeting at the White House. “It’s not just like cold, it’s extraordinary cold. Record-setting cold, over there too, they are having the same, it’s a big pile of bad weather,” added Trump, comparing it to a current cold snap in Washington.
“They’ve never experienced cold like that. And I personally asked President Putin not to fire into Kyiv and the various towns for a week. And he agreed to do that, and I have to tell you, it was very nice.” Trump, who met Putin in Alaska last year amid great fanfare but without achieving any breakthrough, said he trusted the Russian leader to honor the agreement. “People said, ‘don’t waste the call. You’re not going to get that.’ And he did it,” said Trump, without specifying when the conversation took place, or when the purported truce would start. “And we’re very happy that they did it, because on top of everything else, that’s not what they need is missiles coming into their towns and cities.”
– ‘Make this happen’ –
Zelensky, who met Trump in Davos last week despite patchy relations since their Oval Office bust-up nearly a year ago, thanked the US president for his “important statement.” “We hope the United States can make this happen,” the Ukrainian leader said. The pause had initially been discussed last weekend during three-way talks in Abu Dhabi between Russia, Ukraine, and the United States, Zelensky said.
A second round of trilateral negotiations in Abu Dhabi is scheduled to begin on Sunday as Trump pushes his plan to end the nearly four-year-old invasion by Russia. Putin met Emirati counterpart Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan in Moscow on Thursday ahead of those talks. The UAE has emerged as a key mediator in the war. The talks come as Ukraine faces one of its most difficult periods since Russia’s February 2022 invasion, with Moscow’s forces grinding slowly on in the east and bitter cold closing in.
Ukraine’s state weather agency on Thursday forecast a drastic dip in temperatures to as low as minus 30C in coming days as authorities race to restore services. Zelensky warned in an evening address on Wednesday of fresh Russian attacks on energy facilities. Russian attacks killed six people in central and southern Ukraine on Thursday, regional authorities and emergency services said.
But Trump has repeatedly said in recent days that he believes a ceasefire is possible. At the cabinet meeting on Thursday, Trump said there had been “a lot of progress” in the talks. Trump’s roaming envoy Steve Witkoff said he was also confident there would be a truce, saying that the US president had a “friendship” with his Russian counterpart. “The president, what he said, is true,” he said in response to an AFP reporter at the premiere of a documentary about Trump’s wife Melania. “And I think that he and Vladimir Putin have a friendship, and I think that allows them to talk and to have a relationship that hopefully will help things out here, get to a settlement and save a lot of lives.”
– Danny KEMP
© 2024 AFP
