Trump calls Putin’s seizure of Ukrainian territory a ‘genius move’

Former president makes comments after weeks of tensions in Ukraine

Former President Donald Trump has finally broken his silence on the ongoing issue of tensions with Russia over its military buildup near Ukraine as Russia announces that troops will move into the disputed Donbas region which Russia annexed in 2014.

In an interview with Clay Travis and Buck Sexton at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, the former president heaped praise on Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, and expanded on a statement he issued via his office earlier in the day claiming that Mr Putin would never have triggered the current crisis under his leadership.

Mr Trump explained to the two conservative hosts that Mr Putin’s decision to recognise the Donbas region as “independent” was in fact a “genius” move, an echo of the effusive praise he heaped on his Russian counterpart while president.

“I went in yesterday and there was a television screen, and I said, ‘This is genius.’ Putin declares a big portion of the Ukraine – of Ukraine. Putin declares it as independent. Oh, that’s wonderful,” said Mr Trump, crowing about the Russian leader’s supposed strategic brilliance.

“I said, ‘How smart is that?’ And he’s gonna go in and be a peacekeeper,” Mr Trump went on, before quipping that the massive Russian military buildup in Russian and Belarusian territory amounted to “the strongest peace force I’ve ever seen”.

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Mr Trump then went on to claim that “this never would have happened” with his administration, and claimed erroneously that President Joe Biden had no response to the latest developments in the region. In fact, Mr Biden unveiled a new list of sanctions he said his administration would put in place immediately, taking the same step that Prime Minister Boris Johnson of the UK and Canada’s Justin Trudeau) did following Moscow’s announcement on Tuesday.

The US president also announced that his administration would go through with his threat to work with Germany’s government to end the Nord Stream 2 pipeline project, which was set to carry natural gas from Russia to Europe.

“And you know what the response was from Biden? There was no response. They didn’t have one for that. No, it’s very sad. Very sad,” claimed Mr Trump.

Tuesday marked the first of Mr Trump’s comments on the matter of Ukraine in weeks as he has largely continued to focus his attention on the 6 January committee in the House and his own efforts to assert control over the Republican Party.

The issue represents shaky political ground for the former president who was found to have benefited from secret Russian efforts to denigrate Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2016 and who personally faced impeachment in 2020 for his efforts to persuade Ukraine’s president to open a criminal investigation that would be politically damaging to Joe Biden during the 2020 presidential election.

Mr Trump also famously was accused of not standing up to Mr Putin and presenting a firm show of opposition to Russian efforts to meddle in the 2016 election after the two met during his presidency. At one joint press conference with Mr Putin in 2018 following a joint summit between the two leaders, Mr Trump sided with the Russian leader against his own intelligence agencies regarding whether Moscow interfered in the campaign.