Putin Pummels Kyiv Trump Lies, About Kiev, Tariffs, Dead on Ukraine, Deals with Putin

Liuba Haldetskaya, 76, sitting outside her damaged apartment building on Thursday.Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times

A woman with a cane sits in front of a damaged building.

Liuba Haldetskaya, 76, sitting outside her damaged apartment building on Thursday.Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times  

I'am amazed the main media does not want to say anything too bad about Trump. They are concentrating on the Tariffs but there is so much more happening around Trump and I don't hear it I don't see it. He went after Zelenskyy again today, because He (Zelenk) said Crimea is part of Ukraine and neither him nor the Constitution of the Country allows to be given away to the attacker. Zelenskyy and Europe were given a laundry list of what to make Putin happy. On the List Ukraine gives to Russia all the Territories they have taken or trying to take back. Crimea to Putin, then all the economic pressures Europe has on Putin to come down. What does Putin gets? Everything, Gives up? Nothing. 

Trump with his lies has been campaigning  for Putin and against Ukraine. What do Trump gets? From Putin who already offered Trump the Building he started to built before the war for a Trump Tower in Moscow(Kremlin). He also gets from Putin what ever, we don't know yet but what would a man who gave the war to Putin and united with him against Europe should get? You think about that.

But coming back to Putin. The war in Ukraine was just a way to get rid of the inefficient soldiers and old equipment and test the water for what he wants. Which is what the Soviet Union always wanted Europe (Putin is Soviet Union, he comes from that).

As soon as the war is over in Ukraine, Putin will try to go in to N ATO Counties. Probably Poland first or Netherlands. Which means a war with NATO. He thinks if Russia can get in the right position it can beat nation. Of coarse listening to the media they say Putin will be crazy to fight with NATO because NATO is got this and That. Russia has many times the NUkes that NATO has not counting the US. More men and the equipment they can manufacture particularly if the u$ Helps. 

If Trump were to get a stroke from His cheese burgers and the fried chicken he eats, Putin will feel good  already because Trump is done a lot. He is saying that if Zelenskyy does not make a deal The u$ walks out. Well did the media say what does that mean Mr President? Did anybody asked Trump? NO. Because they are afraid to be too negative about him and loose audience shares. What would happen is what the US gave a taste to Ukraine already. No weapons even if they want to buy with their own money, which is in effect today. Then something the EU or NATO can't give Ukraine..Intelligence of where the Russian troops are. No one has the equivalent of the US satellites that go around our planet 24 hrs a day.When Ukraine hit a weapons spot nobody knew it existed and the equivalent of a small nuke blast goes off how did they find it?

The very average American because he/she is uninformed  and mentally challenged individuals have to deal with the damage he is doing to the country. Damaging so it can't fight anyone. Including Putin. Mainly Putin. They are dealing with with a grim future and day by day their sons and daughters deaths means less and less. Even with a press afraid to be too negative"With the Truth" to Trump but the facts are there. Fox can't hide the whole sky. Still you have some silly tail about tariffs not being a tax on the consumer who pays for the goods that went up at least the amount of Tariffs imposed. Food for not for thought~~ but enough to get some people sick.

By Adam Gonzalez, Publisher

By Kim Barker and Maria Varenikova

Reporting from Kyiv, Ukraine

The New York Times

 

Russia killed at least eight people and injured more than 60 others in a huge attack on Kyiv early Thursday, prompting President Trump to issue a rare public critique of Moscow just hours after he lashed out at President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine.

The assault was the deadliest on the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, since last summer. Explosions could be heard throughout the night; clouds of brown smoke rose over the city as the sun came up.

One missile hit a two-story building with 12 apartments where emergency workers hunted for survivors Thursday morning. A five-story building next door lost all of its windows. People stood outside, staring at the damage and talking on their phones, telling loved ones that they were alive. No military target was visible nearby.

Mr. Zelensky said that nearly 70 missiles, including ballistic ones, and about 150 attack drones had targeted cities across the country — although Kyiv was the hardest hit. 

Before cutting short a trip to South Africa, Mr. Zelensky told a news conference there that he saw no indication Russia was being pressured to agree to a cease-fire. He said with more pressure brought on Moscow, “we will be able to get closer to a complete, unconditional cease-fire.” To him, Mr. Zelensky added, Thursday’s large-scale missile attack on Kyiv instead appeared intended to pressure the United States.

About the same time, Mr. Trump lambasted President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia about the attack, showing how his administration’s positions can seem to flip-flop without warning.

“Vladimir, STOP!” Mr. Trump posted on Truth Social, saying that he was “not happy with the Russian strikes on KYIV.” “Not necessary, and very bad timing,” the post added.

The attack came hours after Mr. Trump and his top aides demanded that Kyiv accept an American-designed plan that would seemingly grant Russia all of the territory it has gained in the war, which started with Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022. The plan also offered Kyiv only vague assurances about the country’s future security. So far, Mr. Zelensky has said Ukraine cannot accept such a deal. 

A Woman Takes a Deep Breath and Makes Her Own Life Decisions

 it...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times

Since taking office in January, the Trump administration has echoed Kremlin talking points in the war, a reversal of previous U.S. policy under the Biden administration. Over the past week, the Trump administration has repeatedly threatened to walk away from the peace process, claiming that the two sides were both intransigent. On Wednesday, planned peace talks in London were downgraded, largely because the United States decided not to attend. 

Mr. Trump later called the Ukrainian president “inflammatory” in a post on social media and said Mr. Zelensky would only “prolong the ‘killing field.’”

“The president’s frustrated; his patience is running very thin,” Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, told reporters later on Wednesday. But she echoed Mr. Trump in appearing to blame Mr. Zelensky, saying that Mr. Trump sought peace but that Ukraine’s leader seemed to be “moving in the wrong direction.”

On Thursday, in his post on Truth Social, Mr. Trump said that he wanted to “get the Peace Deal DONE!”

Mr. Zelensky had earlier pointed out that Ukraine had accepted a U.S. proposal for a 30-day cease-fire in March while Mr. Putin has refused to agree to that plan. Mr. Putin did announce a temporary truce for Easter Sunday, but that seemed like more of a public relations stunt than an actual cease-fire along the front lines. Ukrainian cities, at least, were largely spared for the truce’s 30 hours. 

That was not the case early Thursday. Shortly after midnight, the first air alarms sounded.

Yevhenii Plakhotnikov, 40, who sells furniture, lives just across from the two-story apartment building struck by a missile. He said that he woke up to the alarm, heard the buzzing sound of drones and then started getting dressed. A message on Telegram — the messaging platform that many Ukrainians rely on for missile alerts — said a ballistic missile had been launched.

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Mr. Plakhotnikov said he went to the hallway to put on his shoes.

“While I was putting on the second sneaker, I heard the first explosion,” he recalled in an interview. “Then I heard something heavy fall. All my interior doors were torn in half. I opened the door and saw shrapnel flying.”

He said he helped get other people out of his building. There, one man was standing, covered in blood. Another, standing a bit farther away, said merely: “That apartment building in the courtyard is gone.”

Emergency workers searched for survivors in the rubble. At 8:30 a.m. local time, an emergency service spokeswoman, Svitlana Vodolaha, told reporters: “Just now we dug out another person. Alive!”

Tetyana Hrynenko, 58, stood on the street, covering her mouth with her hands and looking up her ruined apartment next to the flattened building.

“The most important thing is that we are alive,” said Ms. Hrynenko, adding that she had heard two explosions, saw clouds of dust and smelled burning. She added: “I heard screams — ‘Help!’ — People were shouting and asking for help. I looked out into the stairwell, and there were no stairs. And I live on the fifth floor.”

Residents managed to clear the stairwell of debris, allowing Ms. Hrynenko and others to make it outside.

Friends and relatives continued to show up outside the demolished apartment building hours after the attack, hoping for good news. But there was little to be had. A brother, 21, and a sister, 19, both died.

On Thursday afternoon, dozens of classmates and friends of Danylo Khudya, 17, came to hold vigil: The teen, known as Danya, was still missing under the rubble, along with his parents. Watching the emergency workers dig, the boys were stone-faced, while many of the girls, including Danya’s girlfriend, sobbed inconsolably. 

“I am waiting for Danya,” said one friend, Denys, 19, who did not want to give his last name.

Ukrainian officials have said that Russia has only intensified attacks against civilians since the start of U.S.-led peace negotiations.

Andriy Yermak, the Ukrainian president’s chief of staff, posted a video on social media showing emergency workers outside a destroyed building on Thursday. “Once again, Russia strikes civilians,” he said. Other Ukrainian officials urged Western partners to replenish Kyiv’s air defenses.

In March, Mr. Trump had pledged to work with Mr. Zelensky to find U.S.-made Patriot air defense systems. But when Mr. Zelensky said this month that he wanted to buy Patriots from the United States, Mr. Trump suggested that Ukraine had “started the war” and said the Ukrainian president was “always looking to purchase missiles.”

Thursday’s attack on Kyiv was one of the deadliest of the war and the worst in the capital since July, when Russian missiles destroyed a children’s hospital in Kyiv and killed more than 20 people throughout the city. Recent deadly missile strikes have also targeted the cities of Sumy and Kryvyi Rih, inflicting large numbers of civilian casualties.

 

The authorities originally said that nine people had been killed in Kyiv on Thursday, but later lowered the number of confirmed fatalities to eight.

As search and rescue efforts continued, those affected by the strike said that they want the war to end but could not see accepting a one-sided deal that would benefit Russia.

“Yesterday we were very disappointed that the negotiations hadn’t moved forward, and then overnight, it hit me directly,” said Ms. Hrynenko as she surveyed her damaged apartment. “I am disappointed. Exhausted.”

Mr. Plakhotnikov said he did not know of a way out for Ukraine.

“There’s no point in continuing the war,” he said, “but it’s also impossible to stop.”

Andrew E. Kramer contributed reporting from Kharkiv, Ukraine, and Oleksandra Mykolyshyn from Kyiv.

Kim Barker is a Times reporter writing in-depth stories about the war in Ukraine.

Maria Varenikova covers Ukraine and its war with Russia.