Comments by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy that dismissed the idea of speaking to U.S. President-elect Donald Trump about Ukraine’s endeavor to join NATO have been presented out of context online.

Trump now intends to maintain US military supplies to Kyiv after his inauguration, but will demand NATO more than double its 2 per cent spending target.

Donald Trump dished to The Post on the power-grip handshakes he shared ... But the pair also talked policy, with Trump saying they were in agreement about NATO nations “paying their fair share” towards the European military alliance.

US President-elect Donald Trump has said he’ll quickly negotiate an end to Russia’s war in Ukraine. This has got NATO allies wondering if he’ll withdraw US support for the government in Kyiv and force it to accept a permanent Russian occupation of Ukrainian land.

No, Trump cannot legally withdraw the United States from NATO via executive order. Federal law requires congressional approval to leave the alliance. There is a law explicitly prohibiting the president from unilaterally leaving NATO, though some experts say there may be ways around it.

Amid the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war, tensions between the military alliance, which supports Kyiv in its defense efforts, and the Kremlin have continued.

Vladimir Putin wants a sit-down with Donald Trump as equals in which they divide the world into spheres of influence.

NATO has taken over coordination of Western military aid to Ukraine from the U.S. as planned, a source said on Tuesday, in a move widely seen as aiming to safeguard the support mechanism against NATO sceptic U.

Donald Trump could demand Nato allies increase defence spending to 5 per cent of GDP, more than doubling the current target. The president-elect’s team told European officials they will be expected to increase military budgets after he takes office on Jan 20, as he passes the burden of the war in Ukraine on to Europe.

At a CNN town hall in May 2023, Donald Trump promised that if elected, he would end the war in Ukraine in a single day. That bullish pledge has now become a familiar refrain, with the president-elect insisting that he uniquely has the nous to bring Russia and Ukraine to the table and force a truce.