The Ukrainian leader was kicked out of the White House after a heated exchange with President Trump and Vice President Vance

The meeting between Vladimir Zelensky and US President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday devolved into an openly hostile confrontation during which the Ukrainian leader was accused of ungratefulness to the American people and an unwillingness to negotiate an end to the conflict with Russia.

Read the transcript of the heated exchange below:

US President Donald Trump: The world, I am aligned with the world and I want to get this thing [the Ukraine conflict] over with. You see the hatred he has got for [Russian President] Putin? It is very tough for me to make a deal with that kind of hate. He has got tremendous hatred, and I understand that, but I can tell you the other side is not exactly in love with, you know, him either. So it is not a question of alignment. I am aligned with the world. I want to get the thing set. I am allied with Europe. I want to see if we can get this thing done. You want me to be tough? I could be tougher than any human being you have ever seen. I would be so tough, but you are never going to get a deal that way, so that is the way it goes.

US Vice President J.D. Vance: I would respond to this. So look, for four years, the US, we had a president [Joe Biden], who stood up at press conferences and talked tough about Vladimir Putin. And then Putin invaded Ukraine and destroyed a significant chunk of the country. The path to peace and the path to prosperity is maybe engaging in diplomacy. We tried the pathway of [former US President] Joe Biden, of thumping our chest and pretending that the US president’s words mattered more than the US president’s actions. What makes America a good country? Is America engaging in diplomacy? That is what president Trump is doing.

Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky: Can I ask you?

Vance: Sure. Yeah, Yeah.

Zelensky: OK. So he [Putin] occupied our parts, big parts of Ukraine, part of East and Crimea. So, he occupied it on 2014. So, during a lot of years… I am not speaking about just Biden, but those time was President Obama, then President Trump, then President Biden, now the President Trump and, God bless, now President Trump will stop him. But during 2014 nobody stopped him. He just occupied and took. He killed people. You know what the contact line…

Trump: 2015.

Zelensky: 2014.

Trump: 2014 – I was not here.

Zelensky: Yes, but during 2014 till 2022 what the situation the same that people are been dying on the contact line. Nobody stopped him. You know that we had conversations with him, a lot of conversations, my bilateral conversation and we signed with him, me – like a new president [of Ukraine] – in 2019 I signed with him the deal. I signed with him [French President Emmanuel] Macron and [then-German Chancellor Angela] Merkel, we signed ceasefire. Ceasefire, all of them told me that he will never go. We signed with him gas contract. Gas contract, yes, but after that he broken the ceasefire. He killed our people and he did not exchange prisoners. We signed the exchange of prisoners, but he did not do it. What kind of diplomacy, J.D., you are speaking about? What do you… what do you mean?

Vance: I am talking about the kind of diplomacy that is going to end the destruction of your country that...

Zelensky: Yes, but what do you...

Vance: Mr. President with respect, I think it is disrespectful for you to come into the Oval Office and try to litigate this in front of the American media. Right now you guys are going around enforcing conscripts to the front lines because you have manpower problems. You should be thanking the [US] president for trying to bring an end to this conflict…

Source: RT - Daily news