Zelensky Claims He Would Resign in Exchange for Ukraine NATO Membership

Amid the ongoing public spat with U.S. President Donald Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has claimed that he would be willing to step down in exchange for NATO membership for his country.

Zelensky, apparently still miffed about not being included in opening talks between the Russians and a White House delegation in Ryiad earlier this week, seems intent on negotiating the peace process from the outside in public.

Speaking in a Kyiv press conference on Sunday, the Ukrainian leader said that he would be willing to resign from his office to help the peace process. However, he quickly caveated by suggesting that this would come in the form of Ukraine’s joining NATO, officially a non-starter for Russia, per the Kremlin.

“If there is peace for Ukraine, if you really need me to leave my post, I am ready. … I can exchange it for NATO,” Zelensky said per London’s Daily Telegraph.

Zelensky’s comments came in the wake of U.S. President Donald Trump branding a “dictator” for cancelling presidential and legislative elections last year under the martial law implemented following the Russian invasion.

The Ukrainian leader denied the characterisation but claimed that he wasn’t offended by it, saying: “I wouldn’t call Donald Trump’s words a compliment… I wasn’t offended, but a dictator would be. I’m not. I’m the legally elected president.”

The United States, the principal financial and military backer of Kyiv, has suggested that NATO membership is unlikely. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said last week, “The United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement.”

It was later trailed that NATO membership could be used as carrot and stick to keep Russia loyal to any future peace agreement, by making instant automatic membership for Ukraine a condition if Moscow breached the deal, but this hasn’t been publicly confirmed by Washington yet.

In his press conference, Zelensky also addressed the issue of Ukraine’s mineral rights, which President Trump has suggested could be used to recoup the American taxpayer money spent propping up the country’s war efforts.

Despite Kyiv briefing the press earlier over the weekend that Zelensky was “not ready” to discuss a mineral deal, the Ukrainian leader said on Sunday that “we are making progress” and that his government had held talks with Washington about the matter earlier in the day.

However, Zelensky rejected the notion that Ukraine “owes” America for the hundreds of billions spent on the conflict and that he will not sign a deal ” that will be paid by 10 generations of Ukrainians.” Zelensky went on to demand that he be granted a meeting with President Trump to discuss that and more prior to any meeting with Vladimir Putin.

The Ukrainian leader’s strategy of airing out his positions in the media has apparently ruffled some feathers in the Trump administration, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio saying last week that he was “personally very upset” that Zelensky appeared to be talking out of two sides of his mouth depending on the context.

Speaking with journalist Catherine Herridge, Rubio said that he and his team had spoken to Zelensky about a “joint venture” on minerals, which he said could represent a form of a security guarantee in lieu of American boots on the ground, to which he claims Zelensky was amenable.

“I read two days later that Zelensky is out there saying, ‘I rejected the deal. I told him, “No way,” that we’re not doing that.’ That’s not what happened in that meeting,” Rubio said, adding that President Trump will not accept that sort of “counter-messaging to try to, you know, hustle us in that regard.”