By The Moscow Times | Created at 2026-10-16 11:25:13 | Updated at 2026-10-16 12:08:42
53 minutes ago
The Kremlin expressed “full” agreement Friday with U.S. President Donald Trump’s criticism of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky over the stalled peace efforts.
“The fact that Zelensky doesn’t want to take responsibility and enter a peaceful settlement process is unambiguous,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters during a daily briefing.
“Here, we fully agree with President Trump’s point of view,” Peskov said.
Trump sharply criticized Zelensky in an interview with the Newsmax outlet, saying he believes Russia and Ukraine will end up reaching a ceasefire after the Ukrainian leader steps down.
“He doesn’t want to settle. He says he wants to settle, but he doesn’t,” Trump said of Zelensky and the conflict running for more than four and a half years.
Trump noted that both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Zelensky would like to see the war end, “but I think I find Zelensky to be more difficult to deal with than Putin.”
Putin continues to demand that Ukraine cede full control of the Donetsk region as a prerequisite for any ceasefire agreement — a condition Kyiv has repeatedly rejected.
Sources close to the Kremlin told Bloomberg last month that Putin expects Russian forces to take full control of the Donetsk region by late February 2027.
At a summit in Brussels on Friday, European leaders pushed back against the growing rift between Washington and Kyiv, offering unconditional backing to Zelensky as winter approaches.
Despite their public backing, European officials reportedly plan to privately urge Zelensky to tone down his public criticism of Trump.
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