Zelensky to Meet Trump Tuesday Amidst Escalating Russian Tensions & New Sanctions
NEW YORK – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is scheduled to meet with former U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday, on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, as Europe grapples with heightened Russian aggression and a newly announced round of sanctions. The meeting comes as Russia attempts to ”intimidate us to weaken our support for Ukraine,” according to French Minister of foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot.
Barrot characterized Friday’s incursion of three Russian planes into Estonian airspace as “a very serious event, the most serious for twenty years in Estonia,” labeling it a ”deliberate escalation.” He asserted Russia is acting this way “as she is failing on the forehead,” noting a lack of progress on the eastern front of Ukraine for three years. “She seeks to intimidate us to weaken our support for Ukraine, to try to get what she cannot do on the military level by other means. But it goes without saying that we will not give up anything,” Barrot stated in an interview on TF1 this morning.
NATO members are set to convene tomorrow to “define the responses to be provided political and operational to dissuade any new attempted intimidation.”
The developments coincide with the European Commission’s declaration last week of the nineteenth package of sanctions against Russia. Barrot welcomed the sanctions, highlighting their coordination with the United States – a level of alignment not seen since Trump’s return to the White House. He described the sanctions as working ”like a flowing knot, gradually to suffocate the resources that Vladimir Putin engulfs in this colonial war.” The new sanctions are expected to include a ban on Russian gas imports by the end of 2026.
