'Upset, hurt, angry, betrayed': How local Ukrainians feel about the Trump administration's talks with Russia
Mariia Solovii applied to dozens of colleges in the United States after Russia invaded her home country of Ukraine in 2022. She said she considered the U.S. “the center of global freedom, democracy, and I think most importantly, a nation that sort of never abandons its allies.”
But now, as President Trump’s administration enters talks with Russian counterparts about ending the war in Ukraine — without inviting Ukrainian leaders — she said her opinion has changed.
“So far, the way this looks for me and my family is kind of like Washington is not wanting to take responsibility for those that it has committed itself to,” said Solovii, now a sophomore at Harvard College.
Many with ties to Ukraine living in Greater Boston say they’re hurt by how Trump is aligning himself with Russian leader Vladimir Putin. In the three years since Russia invaded Ukraine, the Biden administration sent Ukraine billions in military and financial support. But this week, Trump inaccurately blamed Ukraine for starting the war — echoing comments Putin has made.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy responded saying he respected Trump and the American people, but lamented that the president is living “in this disinformation space.” Trump countered on social media, calling Zelenskyy a “Dictator without Elections.” (Under martial law, Ukraine’s electoral process is suspended until a ceasefire is in place.)
Trump’s recent comments have been disturbing for Jane Yavarow and her fellow parishioners at St. Andrew’s Ukrainian Orthodox Church in Boston’s Jamaica Plain neighborhood. Her congregation has been sending money and supplies to Ukraine since the war began.
“?I'm very upset, hurt, angry, betrayed by what's going on with our president, President Trump,” said Yavarow. “Ukraine did not start this war. They were attacked for wanting to be like the United States. They want to be democratic. They want to be free.”
Yavarow, the parish president, said the majority of her parishioners have family members in Ukraine. She added that Ukraine needs to be present for peace negotiations, and any resolution or concessions that come out of talks needs to be reasonable for her country.
“How can you negotiate something for somebody when you're not invited to the table,” said Yavarow. “We have been attacked. Ukraine has been attacked and nobody wants war.”
Solovii, the Harvard student who is co-president of the undergraduate Ukraine Solidarity Group, was 16 and living in Kyiv when the war began. Both her parents are in the military. She said she remembers waking up on the first day of the war and seeing smoke outside her windows.
“?I just remember asking my mom, like ‘Did the war begin?’ " she said. “And she said, ‘yes,’ and she has been called to work and I was left at home and told to go to the basement with the rest of our neighbors.”
She remembers a small field, in the center of the city, where people are sticking flags in the ground when someone they knew died.
“I remember when the war just broke out, there were like some flags in the ground,” she said. “I think a year after [it started] it was already like a full field of different flags and not just Ukrainian flags, but like people from the U.S. … from volunteers who came to support.”
Olga ?Lisovska, a Ukrainian opera singer living in Newton, is also disappointed in the current rhetoric, but said her Ukrainian friends in Massachusetts and in her home country have trust in the American people and recognize their support for Ukraine, despite Trump’s recent actions.
“You can't just erase — in three days or four days — the decades of American foreign policy and trust that America has instilled in nations,” ?Lisovska said. “So that is why everybody is watching, kind of stressfully, to see how everything is going to play out.”
Still, ?Lisovska said she doesn’t see a future that is anything less than full freedom for her country.
“?I really personally do not feel that Ukrainians are ready to give up any of their sovereign territory,” she said.
Eugene Goncharov is a member of the American Coalition for Ukraine and is helping to organize a rally on Sunday in Boston to mark three years since Russia invaded his home country. He said he’s disappointed by Trump’s rhetoric, noting his family still in Ukraine and friends who have died in the war.
“Nobody wants peace more than Ukrainians,” Goncharov said. “There isn't a Ukrainian family that hasn't lost somebody. But peace has to come justly, and peace has to come with security guarantees.”
U.S. Rep. Jake Auchincloss agrees. The Massachusetts congressman represents Newton, and has Ukrainian ancestry.
He said guarantees for Ukraine need to include security for its eastern border with Russia, access to the Black Sea and membership in the European Union.
“The American people recognize the moral imperative as well as the strategic value of standing by our ally as it fights on the front lines of freedom and democracy,” Auchincloss told WBUR. “And yet we have a president who is a Putin fanboy and seems intent on undercutting the American and NATO position to the benefit of the Kremlin.”
Auchincloss said no future peace negotiations should happen without Ukraine, and said there needs to be continued bi-partisan action by Congress in support of Ukraine and its people.
“?Vladimir Putin, so far, is running circles around Donald Trump and his JV team,” he said.
By: Amanda Beland
Source: WBUR