Starmer on White House pressure to criticize Zelenskyy over Trump dispute - NYT

He said this in an interview with The New York Times.

Addressing Trump’s actions — ranging from imposing a 25% tariff on British steel to criticizing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy — Starmer acknowledged that the US president had caused "quite a degree of disorientation."

The right approach, he said, was to avoid falling for Trump’s provocations.

"On the day in which the Oval Office meeting between President Trump and President Zelensky didn’t go particularly well, we were under pressure to come out very critically with, you know, flowery adjectives to describe how others felt,” Mr. Starmer recalled.

“I took the view that it was better to pick up the phone and talk to both sides to try and get them back on the same page,” - he added.

Starmer sent his national security adviser, Jonathan Powell, to Kyiv to advise Zelenskyy on how to repair his relationship with Trump.

He then called Trump to update him on progress in Kyiv and to pave the way for a phone call between Trump and Zelenskyy. When the two presidents spoke again, Zelenskyy backed Trump’s peace efforts.

• President Donald Trump stated that his recent phone calls with Russian leader Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy were “two very good conversations.”