A critical turning point will be the U.S. presidential election, Mr. Zelensky said, when it becomes clear whether Joe Biden, a full-throated supporter of Ukraine, will get another term in the White House, or whether the presidency will return to Donald Trump, an admirer of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
After the November election, “we will understand what will happen next,” Mr. Zelensky said.
A US$60-billion package of military aid for Ukraine that Mr. Biden requested has been stalled since late last year, with Mr. Trump’s allies in Congress thus far blocking its passage.
“Can you replace the defence capabilities of the United States? The answer is no,” Mr. Zelensky said. “I do have hopes for Congress. I’m sure there will be a positive decision, because otherwise it will leave me wondering what kind of world we are living in.”
But Mr. Zelensky said Ukraine would fight on regardless, dismissing suggestions that he should prepare his country for negotiations with Russia. Any peace that Mr. Putin would agree to would almost certainly involve ceding Russia the five southern and eastern regions of Ukraine he has ostensibly annexed.
Mr. Zelensky laughed off a question from The Globe and Mail about whether he would take a surprise phone call from the Russian leader. “He doesn’t have a mobile phone, and I don’t know how to use a telegraph machine from 1917,” Mr. Zelensky said, referring to the 71-year-old Mr. Putin’s aversion to modern methods of communication. “He won’t call me because he doesn’t want peace.”
Instead, Mr. Zelensky said he would promote Ukraine’s own 10-point peace plan – which calls for a complete Russian withdrawal from the approximately 15 per cent of Ukrainian territory it currently occupies – at a summit that Switzerland is set to hold in the coming months. The meeting is expected to take place without Russian representation.
Rather than negotiating a withdrawal, Mr. Putin’s troops are slicing away more Ukrainian territory. Mr. Zelensky said Russian forces were “exerting a lot of pressure” in the eastern Kharkiv region, with an immediate focus on capturing the strategic crossroads of Kupyansk.
The situation along the front line was particularly grim toward the end of 2023, Mr. Zelensky said, when shortages of artillery shells meant that Ukraine could only return fire once for every 12 rounds the Russians shot. That ratio had recently improved to six or seven to one, he said, but that was a long way from the near-parity Ukraine had achieved when it was able to liberate large swaths of occupied territory in late 2022.
“When we have a rate of one to one, we will definitely show the results,” he said.
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