Trump told Time on April 22: "Crimea will stay with Russia. And Zelensky understands that, and everybody understands that it's been with them for a long time."
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has repeatedly said that his country will never accept Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea.
The US president also believes Ukraine will never join NATO, according to Time.
"I don't think they’ll ever be able to join NATO," he said.
"I think that's been—from day one, I think that's been, that's I think what caused the war to start was when they started talking about joining NATO," Trump said in the interview.
"If that weren't brought up, there would have been a much better chance that it wouldn’t have started," he added.
Meanwhile, Trump's envoy Steve Witkoff arrived in Moscow on Friday where he is expected to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin who has so far rebuffed Washington's calls for a Ukraine ceasefire, the AP news agency reported.
The United States has proposed easing sanctions on Russia as part of efforts to broker a peace deal between Moscow and Kyiv, according to reports last week.
Moscow has maintained that Kyiv must recognise the annexation of four Ukrainian regions by Russia and give up its aspirations to join NATO—conditions Ukraine has repeatedly rejected.
Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, starting the largest armed conflict in Europe since World War II.
Friday is day 1,156 of Russia's war on Ukraine.
(gs)
Source: IAR, PAP, time.com, AP