White House wants recorded apology from Zelensky – Fox News
Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky will have to publicly apologize for his demeanor during a meeting with US President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance if he wishes to continue negotiations on a rare earths mineral deal, Fox News has reported, citing an unnamed American official.
Several weeks prior to the bitter altercation at the White House, Kiev and Washington had been thrashing out an agreement that would have granted the US access to Ukraine’s natural resources. The process has, however, been left in limbo in the wake of Zelensky’s heated faceoff with the American leadership.
In a report on Monday, Fox News correspondent Peter Doocy said that “there’s quite a disconnect happening here at the White House with their allies in Kiev.” He further claimed, “I have been told by a senior official here that nothing’s gonna happen with this minerals deal until Zelensky goes in front of cameras and makes an explicit public apology for the way that he behaved… in the Oval Office.”
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian leader himself told the BBC on Sunday that he was willing to continue a “constructive dialogue” with Washington and sign the agreement.
Hours after the confrontational episode on Friday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio similarly advised Zelensky to apologize “for wasting our time... [and] turning this thing into the fiasco for him that it became.”
The Ukrainian leader, in turn, told Fox News that he did not feel he owed Trump and Vance an apology.
Speaking to the same outlet on Monday, National Security Adviser Mike Waltz described Zelensky as the “problem” due to his refusal to “talk peace.”
“Time is not on his side. Time is not on the side of just forever continuing this conflict,” the official said.
On Sunday, Waltz made similar remarks in an interview with CNN, adding that “if it becomes apparent that President Zelensky’s either personal motivations or political motivations are divergent from ending the fighting in his country, then I think we have a real issue on our hands.”
“We need a leader that can deal with us, eventually deal with the Russians, and end this war,” he explained.
The Friday meeting at the White House quickly descended into a shouting match, with Trump accusing his visitor of failure to show gratitude and insisting that Kiev does not “have the cards.” He also stated that Ukraine would have lost to Russia already if not for generous US assistance.
