Secretary of State Marco Rubio accused Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday of lying about American demands and expressed readiness to divert weapons intended for Kyiv to support the war against Iran.
Zelensky stated in an exclusive interview with Reuters that the United States was pressuring Ukraine to cede the eastern Donbass region to Russia before finalizing post-war security guarantees.
Zelensky alleged that President Donald Trump had chosen a strategy of pressuring Ukraine, not Russia, regarding the war’s end. He emphasized that the United States was ready to finalize the security guarantees document only if Ukraine agreed to withdraw from Donbass.
“Americans are ready to finalize these guarantees at the highest level as soon as Ukraine is prepared to withdraw its troops from Donbass,” Zelensky asserted, warning that such an action would endanger Ukraine’s security and that of Europe as a whole.
The president also noted that the U.S. was focused on its own conflict with Iran, explaining why Trump was pressuring Ukraine to quickly end the war.
“This is a lie,” Rubio countered when asked about the Ukrainian leader’s comments by reporters.
“I saw him say that, and it’s unfortunate that he says that because he knows it’s not true,” Rubio stated in Paris after discussions with the G7.
“What we told him is clear: security guarantees will not take effect until the war is over because otherwise we are getting involved in the war ourselves,” added the U.S. Secretary of State.
“Any diversion has not yet occurred, but it could happen,” remarked Marco Rubio.
“If we need something for America and it’s American, we will keep it for America first.”
Rubio clarified that there had been no changes made to the Prioritized Ukrainian Requirements List (PURL), an initiative set up by NATO after Trump’s return, where European allies fund weapons requested by Ukraine that are purchased from the United States.
