Zelenskyy Smacks Down Trump’s Boasts That He Can End the Russia-Ukraine Conflict in a Day: He’s ‘Already Had These 24 Hours’

Volodymyr Zelenskyy was skeptical of Donald Trump’s claim that if he were still president, he could bring Ukraine and Russia to a peace agreement and end the war between them in a single day.

The Ukrainian president spoke with ABC News’ Martha Raddatz about his country’s latest counteroffensive efforts against Russia’s invasion. When the subject turned to the future of the U.S.’s military assistance to Ukraine, Raddatz noted Trump’s oft–repeated claim that he could have the Ukraine-Russia conflict “settled” in 24 hours if elected president again.

In a translated response, Zelenskyy said, “It seems to me that the sole desire to bring the war to an end is beautiful. But this desire should be based on some real-life experience. Well, it looks as if Donald Trump had already these 24 hours once in his time. We were at war, not a full-scale war, but we were at war, and as I assume, he had that time at his disposal, but he must have had some other priorities.”

While the Russian invasion of Ukraine began after Trump was out of office, Zelenskyy was presumably referring to the years of tensions between the two countries before full-blown military conflict broke out in 2022. In terms of how the war could end, Zelensky rejected the idea of a peace plan where Ukraine would surrender its lands to Russia, a notion Trump has floated before.

“If we are talking about ending the war at the cost of Ukraine — in other words, to make us give up our territories, well — I think, in this way, [Joe] Biden could have brought it to an end even in five minutes, but we would not agree,” Zelensky said.

Watch above via ABC.