Good morning. After the shocking treatment he received at the White House on Friday, Volodymyr Zelenskyy was on friendlier turf yesterday – but whether a bear hug from Keir Starmer and an audience with King Charles will ultimately prove consequential for the war in Ukraine is still anyone’s guess.
The Ukrainian president was in the UK to attend a European summit, convened by Starmer, to take steps towards new proposals that might be able to find support in Kyiv and Washington alike. And while there were some signs of European unity, the White House and its surrogates were still suggesting that Zelenskyy was guilty of some sort of insult to the United States that might be enough to make a durable peace impossible. Last night, Zelenskyy refused to say whether he believed he had been ambushed – but said that he was ready to talk to Trump again.
