President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky participated in a bilateral meeting and press conference on Tuesday at the United Nations General Assembly, where Trump told reporters that NATO countries should shoot down Russian aircraft that enter their airspace.
Zelensky and Trump met privately for about one hour after talking to reporters ahead of their meeting, according to the White House press pool.
One reporter asked Trump if he thinks “NATO countries should shoot down Russian aircraft if they enter their airspace?” to which Trump responded, “Yes, I do.’
Later in the press conference, another reporter followed up, asking if the United States would support NATO allies in such a scenario.
“Depends on the circumstances, but we’re very strong toward NATO. NATO has stepped up, he said, noting that member countries have upped their defense contributions from two percent to five percent of their GDP. “Trillions of dollars is being pumped in, and they’re paying us for the weapons that we sent.”
Trump also noted that the “Russian economy is terrible right now” when asked about progress he has made in bringing a close to the war. Last month, Trump notably placed a 25 percent tariff on India, on top of an existing 25 percent tariff, in response to purchases of Russian oil.
“Well, the biggest progress is that the Russian economy is terrible right now, as you know. It’s crashing, and that, frankly, Ukraine is doing a very good job of stopping this very large army. It’s pretty amazing. You know, this is a war that should have ended in three days, four days,” he said.
“People said it was going to be very quick, and you got to hand it to the Ukrainian soldiers and everybody involved. It’s still going on. And that’s not a good thing for Russia,” he continued, adding Russia does not “look very distinguished” after “three and a half years of very hard fighting.”
Moments after the meeting, Trump wrote in a bombshell Truth Social post that he believes Ukraine “is in a position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form” with the support of the European Union.
Trump is also slated to have bilateral meetings with French President Emmanuel Macron and Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, per the pool. He notably met with European Union President Ursula von der Leyen and Argentinian President Javier Milei at the General Assembly as well.
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