Donald Trump has warned that if Vladimir Putin attempts to conquer all of Ukraine, it will lead to the “downfall” of Russia, while also criticising Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a Sunday night post on Truth Social.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with him. What the hell happened to him? Right? He’s killing a lot of people. I’m not happy about that,” Trump told reporters at the airport in Morristown, New Jersey, as he prepared to return to Washington.
Trump’s comments were a reaction to a Russian barrage of 367 drones and missiles at Ukrainian cities overnight on Sunday, including the capital Kyiv, in the largest aerial attack of the war so far, killing at least 12 people and injuring dozens more.
The dead included three children in the northern region of Zhytomyr, local officials there said.
Trump has been trying to get both sides to agree to a ceasefire in the three-year-old war in Ukraine, and he spoke for more than two hours with Putin last week.
“Always gotten along with him, but he’s sending rockets into cities and killing people, and I don’t like it at all,” Trump said.
Asked if he was considering more sanctions on Russia, the President said: “Absolutely.”
Earlier, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on the US, which has taken a softer public line on Russia and Putin, since Trump took office in January this year for a second term, to speak out.
