"If it means peace for Ukraine, if my departure is really necessary, I am ready," Zelensky said during a news conference in Kyiv when asked if he was ready to resign in exchange for peace in his country, Poland's PAP news agency reported.
"I could exchange this for NATO membership—if that were the condition—immediately," he added, as cited by the Polish state news agency.
Zelensky was speaking after US President Donald Trump on Wednesday denounced him as "a dictator without elections" and warned that he must "move fast" to secure peace with Russia or risk losing his country.
Zelensky's official five-year term as president expired in 2024, but he has opposed holding elections while Ukraine remains under full-scale Russian invasion—a stance backed by his major domestic political opponents, the Reuters news agency reported.
Trump has also mocked Zelensky as "a modestly successful comedian" and accused him of talking the United States into spending USD 350 billion "to go into a war that couldn’t be won, that never had to start, but a war that he, without the U.S. and Trump, will never be able to settle."
Speaking to reporters in Florida on Tuesday, Trump blamed Ukraine's authorities for the war and suggested they "could have made a deal" with Russia earlier.
Russia invaded Ukraine by land, air and sea on February 24, 2022, starting the largest armed conflict in Europe since World War II.
Sunday is day 1,095 of Russia's war on Ukraine.
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Source: IAR, PAP, Reuters