President Donald Trump is set to host Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for talks at the White House on Friday, with the U.S. leader signaling he’s not ready to agree to sell Kyiv a long-range missile system that the Ukrainians say they desperately need. Zelenskyy gets his one-on-one with Trump a day after the U.S. president and Russian President Vladimir Putin held a lengthy phone call to discuss the conflict. In recent days, Trump had shown an openness to selling Ukraine long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles, even as Putin warned that such a move would further strain the U.S.-Russian relationship. But following Thursday’s call with Putin, Trump appeared to downplay the prospects of Ukraine getting the missiles, which have a range of about 995 miles (1,600 kilometers.) “We need Tomahawks for the United States of America too,” Trump said. “We have a lot of them, but we need them. I mean we can’t deplete our country.” Zelenskyy had been seeking the weapons that would allow Ukrainian forces to strike deep into Russian territory and target key military sites, energy facilities and critical infrastructure. Zelenskyy has argued such strikes would help compel Putin to take Trump’s calls for direct negotiations to end the war more seriously.
NN: Ukraine gets screwed again.