The demand for an unconditional ceasfire
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy agreed on Sunday to meet face-to-face with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Turkey.
Putin initially proposed the Thursday meeting this weekend, and President Donald Trump prompted Zelenskyy to accept the offer. Putin said the talks in Istanbul must be held without preconditions and with the goal of lasting peace.
"We await a full and lasting ceasefire, starting from tomorrow, to provide the necessary basis for diplomacy. There is no point in prolonging the killings. And I will be waiting for Putin in Türkiye on Thursday. Personally. I hope that this time the Russians will not look for excuses," Zelenskyy wrote.
Trump encouraged Zelenskyy to accept Putin's meeting earlier on Sunday. Ukraine and Russia are currently under a ceasefire marking the anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe.
www.foxnews.com - Zelenskyy agrees to meet with Putin on Thursday
An outlook perspective
Following the May 9th Victory Day parade in Moscow, Russia resumed full-scale military operations in Ukraine, including overnight drone strikes. Despite a brief pause around the parade, hostilities quickly resumed. Ukraine had attempted to disrupt the parade with hundreds of drones and missiles, which Russia largely intercepted.
Colonel Douglas Macgregor criticized the West’s continued surprise at Russian aggression, arguing that Russia has consistently stated it would not stop fighting until its objectives are met. He also condemned what he sees as strategic confusion and inconsistency from former President Trump, who reportedly aligned with European leaders in calling for a 30-day ceasefire. Macgregor views this as a betrayal of Trump’s earlier position acknowledging Russia's grievances and territorial claims.
He expressed concern that Trump’s current stance undermines any potential credibility with Russia and aligns him with globalist leaders in Europe who Macgregor blames for weakening national identities. He believes the West is prolonging the war by continuing to arm Ukraine and asserts that Ukraine’s government is selling off the country’s assets while being propped up by Western powers.
Despite talk of peace talks in Turkey, Macgregor remains skeptical, arguing that unless Ukraine accepts neutrality and recognizes Russia's territorial gains, negotiations are unlikely to succeed. He concludes that Russia is perceived globally as defending its interests, while Ukraine has been exploited by Western powers.
I think that in the United States once it becomes clear what the Russians are going to do, Donald Trump is going to lose face. His administration will be shown for what it is, incoherent unfocused and failing. Who knows what the consequences politically for him will be, because everyone in Congress will attack him. And I'm sure he'll be told that he's responsible for losing Ukraine, which is nonsense. Ukraine was never his to begin with. He didn't want it. But instead of being smart and and bailing out of this nonsense early on, he listened to all the wrong people and is stuck like a bug on fly paper. But he'll be held responsible. In Europe itself all of the leadership in Europe will be identified as buffoons, because there's not a damn thing they can do. And if they try to do something, I think in most cases the military leaders certainly on the continent will meet with them and say we can't intervene. We have no capability to do so. We'll be crushed. The one exception of course is Starmer, sitting out there on that island. He may think he can do something but he's probably in even worse shape. Right now the Polish army is much larger, more capable, than the British army or the French army. And they're not going to take this on. They know what's out there. They're not ready for it. So I think this will hasten the end of the globalist regimes, which is a good thing for Europe. They need to go away. All of these globalists need to be canned once and for all. Then Europe needs to be rescued from destruction by this mass migration of people into it, who are not Europeans and never will be, and feel nothing but contempt for European civilization and the Christian foundations that support it. Well that's a that's a pretty dire picture in there.