“Calling the president of such a country a dictator requires a dose of cynicism”: President Pavel reacts to Trump statements
Czechia’s leaders have responded to statements by US President Donald Trump, in which the president called Ukrainian head of state Volodymyr Zelenskyy a “dictator without elections”. President Petr Pavel said that to hold such a view “requires a dose of cynicism”.
Relations between the USA and Ukraine are deteriorating fast, following comments made by US President Donald Trump about his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy. In statements made at his Mar-a-Lago mansion in Florida and then posted on the Truth Social network on Wednesday, Donald Trump openly criticised the Ukrainian head of state, calling him a “dictator” who was responsible for taking Ukraine into “a war that couldn’t be won”. Both the Czech president and prime minister have since disagreed with the claims.
The USA under Mr. Trump’s leadership is currently looking to play the role of a peacemaker, following the president’s campaign promises to end the war in Ukraine “in twenty-four hours”. Their recent efforts have included talks between US and Russian officials in Saudi Arabia, at which Ukrainian representatives were not present.
Now the president appears to be repeating the official Russian positon on the war, portraying Ukraine as the aggressor. In the post on Truth Social, the US president called Mr. Zelenskyy as a “modestly successful comedian”, “very low in Ukrainian polls”, and a “dictator without elections” – a reference to the fact that Ukraine has been under martial law since 2022 and that elections have been suspended.
World leaders reacted quickly to the statements. British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer reaffirmed the UK’s support for Ukraine, noting that countries may “suspend elections during wartime as the UK did during World War Two”. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz called the view “simply wrong and dangerous”, and even former vice-president Mike Pence addressed his one-time superior in a statement beginning “Mr President, Ukraine did not 'start' this war”.
Closer to home, Czech President Petr Pavel also voiced his disagreement. In a statement on the X platform, he wrote: “How can elections be organised in Ukraine with one fifth of its territory held by occupying forces, and the entire country under daily shelling? Calling the president of such a country a dictator requires a dose of cynicism.”
Petr Fiala, the Czech prime minister, also rejected the US president’s comments. Speaking to Czech Television, he furthermore said that Europe should not be “provoked by individual statements on social media”, and should instead work together towards a permanent, sustainable and just peace. This follows from the prime minister’s virtual attendance at meeting of European leaders on Wednesday, convened in Paris by French President Emmanuel Macron.
“The conclusion of that meeting is that we all agree that in this new situation, Europe needs to be stronger, that we need to put more money into our own defence … If we are to be taken seriously, we need to be stronger economically, we need to be stronger militarily, and we need to do something about this. If I were to put it figuratively, we need to put money and weapons on the table and then the world will take us seriously. Europe has neglected this for a long time, but now is the time to change that.”
