Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has expressed hope that US President Donald Trump could influence Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s position on Russia’s war in Ukraine. Speaking to Fox News after meeting Trump on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, Zelenskyy said: “I think that President Trump can change the attitude of Xi Jinping to this war, because China, we don’t feel that China wants to finish this war.” The US has singled out China and India for continuing to purchase Russian oil, which helps fund Moscow’s war effort.
Zelenskyy later told the UN Security Council that China could pressure Russia to end the conflict. “If China truly wanted this war to stop, it could compel Moscow to end the invasion. Without China, Putin’s Russia is nothing,” he said. Kyiv has long accused Beijing of supplying items that can be used in Russia’s war effort, although China maintains it is not a party to the conflict.
Trump, meanwhile, made one of his strongest statements of support for Ukraine, asserting that it can regain all territory lost since the 2022 invasion. In a post on Truth Social, Trump claimed Russia was in “big economic trouble” and that the war should have been won quickly by a “real military power”. Zelenskyy welcomed what he called Trump’s “big shift” in tone on Russia.
Speaking at a press conference in New York, Zelenskyy warned that Russia is launching long-range drones into Nato member states’ airspace to probe defences and identify weaknesses. “He will try to find weak places in Europe, in Nato countries, he will try to do it,” he said, referring to President Vladimir Putin.
A United Nations report published on Tuesday found that Russian authorities have subjected civilian detainees in occupied Ukrainian territories to “widespread” and “systematic” torture, including sexual violence, since the full-scale invasion began in February 2022. The UN rights office concluded that Russia has committed serious violations of international law.
Ukraine’s energy ministry urged decisive international action to secure the removal of Russian forces from the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant after all external power lines were cut off for the tenth time. “Today’s incident once again proves that the Russian occupation is the main threat to the safe operation of the Zaporizhzhia NPP,” the ministry said.
