KYIV, UKRAINE, FEB 20 (AFP/APP/DNA):Volodymyr Zelensky was due to meet on Thursday with US envoy Keith Kellogg after Donald Trump branded the Ukrainian leader a “dictator” and said Russia “have the cards” in any talks to end the war.

The United States has provided essential funding and arms to Ukraine, but the US president has rattled Kyiv and its European backers by opening talks with Moscow they fear could end the war on terms unacceptable to them.

“I think the Russians want to see the war end… But I think they have the cards a little bit, because they’ve taken a lot of territory, so they have the cards,” Trump told reporters late Wednesday.

Under former President Joe Biden, the United States lauded Zelensky as a hero and hammered Moscow with sanctions as Ukraine battled against advancing Russian troops.

But Trump has been harshly critical of the Ukrainian leader, claiming he has subverted democracy and blaming him for starting the war that began with Russia’s full-scale invasion three years ago.

“A Dictator without Elections, Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

Zelensky was elected in 2019 for a five-year term and has remained leader under martial law imposed as his country fights for its survival.

Trump savaged Zelensky, saying “he refuses to have Elections, is very low in Ukrainian Polls, and the only thing he was good at was playing (Joe) Biden ‘like a fiddle.'”

“In the meantime, we are successfully negotiating an end to the War with Russia, something all admit only ‘TRUMP,’ and the Trump Administration, can do.”

Zelensky’s popularity has fallen, but the percentage of Ukrainians who trust him has never dipped below 50 percent since the conflict started, according to the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).