The conversations followed the two-hour-long phone call between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian dictator Vladimir Putin on May 19, which made Trump even more reluctant to apply any meaningful pressure on Moscow to agree to a ceasefire.
According to Zelenskyy’s Telegram post, his discussion with Merz focused on the pan-European effort to steer U.S. foreign policy away from further aligning with Russian interests.
“We also talked about rebuilding Ukraine after the war,” the president added.
“We must start thinking about it now and have a clear plan that will help bring real peace now and support Ukraine later. We will work together to make it happen. Thank you for your support!”
Zelenskyy then spoke with Starmer and thanked him for the new UK sanctions imposed on Russia.
“I thanked him for the new British sanctions that help force Russia to pursue peace,” he said.
“Today we have a British decision on sanctions, one from the EU, and it would be good if the United States helped too. Our European partners are already preparing the next steps in applying pressure on Russia to end the war.”
Later, Zelenskyy had a phone call with Macron.
“I also spoke with President Macron; it was a very substantive discussion,” Zelenskyy stated.
“We are continuing to develop solutions within our ‘coalition of the willing’ — everything is becoming more practical. We discussed support for our military, defense cooperation, and domestic arms production in Ukraine. We also talked in detail about our relations and coordination with the United States.”