Trump: Zelensky ‘not a good guy for us to deal with’

President Trump hit back at Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, saying he was “not a good guy for us to deal with.”

In an interview on Newsmax’s “Finnerty,” Trump was asked about Ukraine resuming attacks on Russian energy targets after the president asked Zelensky to stop such strikes.

“Zelensky is not a good guy for us to deal with,” the president said. “I’m not a big fan of Zelensky. They’ve destroyed that country.”

When asked if he supported further military aid for Ukraine, Trump stated, “Well, I think they’re going to if they’re going to end up with a settlement of some kind, they’re not going to do it with [Zelensky].”

“He doesn’t want to settle. He says he wants to settle, but he doesn’t,” he continued, adding that the war started when former President Obama made Ukraine “give up” Crimea, which Trump called “the most valuable part by far of Ukraine.”

Trump concluded that he believed the war would “end soon. I think they actually both would like to see it end, but I think I find Zelensky to be more difficult to deal with than Putin.”

Trump’s comments mark another escalation in tensions between U.S. and Ukrainian leadership, as Zelensky announced earlier this week that the president’s energy ceasefire was over .

At a summit in Belgium, Zelensky reportedly said he was thankful to have support from the European Union Council, the European Commission and “real leaders,” according to CNN . He continued that he wanted the war to end, but Ukrainian leadership does not “see now signals from the Russian side that they are ready for this.”

Zelensky previously blasted Trump over a deal he struck with Russia on diesel, which the Ukrainian president referred to as “a gift” to Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying that Russia “will ‘repay’ the diesel with further terror and perfidy.”

Trump is facing backlash in the U.S. as a group of GOP senators signed on to a letter condemning Trump’s Russian diesel deal.