Iuliia Mendel, who served as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s spokesperson from 2019 to 2021, is urging him to hold face-to-face talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow. She argues that Zelenskyy’s prior business and political connections in the Russian capital could facilitate a peace agreement.
Mendel told Fox News Digital that Zelenskyy, a former comedian, earned his first millions in Russia and could use those relationships to work toward lasting peace.
“When Zelenskyy was an entertainer, he frequently performed in Moscow,” Mendel said, noting that the Ukrainian president “knows many people within Putin’s inner circle.”
“He built his career in Moscow and made his first millions there, yet today he acts as if he has no connection to them,” she added.
Iuliia Mendel noted that Zelenskyy often performed in Moscow as an entertainer and is acquainted with many figures in Putin’s inner circle. (Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images)
“He needs to travel to Moscow and agree on acceptable compromises,” she said, adding that Zelenskyy should stop “playing maximalist games and posing as a noble actor.”
Mendel’s remarks came as Ukraine, Russia, and the United States prepared for another round of technical peace negotiations, potentially in Abu Dhabi or Switzerland, scheduled for November.
U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner have helped lay the groundwork for renewed negotiations, with officials hoping these efforts could finally produce direct talks between the two leaders.
Before entering politics, Zelenskyy built a successful entertainment career. Beginning in the late 1990s, he performed with the comedy troupe Kvartal 95, competed on the Russian-language comedy program KVN, and later worked as an actor, writer, and producer in film and television.
Mendel said that from the late 1990s onward, Zelenskyy performed on Russian stages and at private events and appeared in films screened across former Soviet republics.
She added that after Russia annexed Crimea and began its war in the Donbas in early 2014, Zelenskyy traveled to Russia to work on the comedy film “Eight New Dates,” which premiered in Russian theaters in 2015.
Before entering politics, Zelenskyy enjoyed a successful career in Ukraine’s entertainment industry. (Shutterstock)
According to Business Insider, many of Zelenskyy’s films were produced in Russian and marketed to Russian audiences, said David Dodson, an American film editor who worked with Zelenskyy.
“He was a beloved comic, actor, and performer in Russia, but everything changed after the 2013-14 Maidan Revolution,” Dodson said.
“People should recognize that Volodya’s films were hugely popular in Russia. Most of his market was there, and he has always been a well-known comedy star in Russia,” Dodson told GQ, clarifying his involvement with the former actor in “Eight First Dates,” released in Russia in 2012.
The film won Best Russian Comedy of the Year at the Russian National Movie Awards in 2013.
In 2019, Zelenskyy pledged to divest from a Cyprus-registered company operating a Russian film studio after investigative journalists revealed that he and his partners still held stakes in three Russian companies, the Kyiv Post reported.
Zelenskyy’s entertainment career made him a household name across Ukraine and other former Soviet republics. He entered politics and won Ukraine’s 2019 presidential election with approximately 73% of the runoff vote, campaigning on promises to combat corruption and secure peace in eastern Ukraine.
Mendel argued that Zelenskyy’s early promise to deliver peace stands in stark contrast to the devastating war that has crippled Ukraine and defined much of his presidency.
Emergency workers respond to the site of a Russian missile strike in Ukraine’s Kyiv region on July 24, 2026. (Press service of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine/Handout via Reuters)
“Zelenskyy became president with record support of 73%,” Mendel said. “He did so because he promised to bring peace to Ukraine.”
“For nearly five years, he has presided over the largest war in Europe since World War II. That says a great deal,” she said.
“While his country bleeds, he must secure a peace deal for his people,” she said, adding that the leader “must put his people’s interests first so that Ukraine can continue to exist as an independent state.”
Whether Zelenskyy should travel to Moscow has become a flashpoint in efforts to arrange direct peace talks.
In 2025, Putin offered to host Zelenskyy for talks in Moscow, but the Ukrainian president declined while Russian forces continued their attacks on Ukraine.
“He can come to Kyiv,” Zelenskyy told ABC News at the time, explaining that he could not visit Moscow while Ukraine remained under Russian missile strikes.
In September, on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly, Russian journalists asked Zelenskyy when he would visit Moscow. He replied, “On a missile.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a ceremony at the Kremlin in Moscow to present state awards to mentors and teachers of participants in Russia’s war in Ukraine. Observers say Putin has tightly suppressed the flow of information to the outside world. (POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
Mendel, however, argued that personal animosity between the two leaders has become the main obstacle to diplomacy.
“Diplomatic efforts are underway to end this brutal and bloody war started by Russia,” she said.
“What we see now is a personal rift between Zelenskyy and Putin that continues to escalate, causing tremendous suffering, leaving Ukraine’s infrastructure, energy grid, and businesses in ruins, and driving refugees to flee,” she said.
Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. More than four years later, peace negotiations remain deadlocked over territory, security guarantees, and the terms of a lasting ceasefire.
Moscow has demanded territorial concessions from Ukraine, including areas that Russian forces do not fully control.
Kyiv has rejected ceding sovereign territory and insists that any agreement include enforceable security guarantees against further Russian aggression.
President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on December 28, 2025, that a Ukraine peace deal is nearing completion following talks in Florida, though territorial disputes remain. (Volodymyr Zelenskyy X)
Mendel also praised President Donald Trump’s efforts to break the diplomatic deadlock, calling him the first Western leader to “challenge the status quo” and consistently press for an end to the war.
“For this reason, many Ukrainians place great hope in his ability to deliver peace,” she said.
“A sustainable peace deal cannot be reached solely between Zelenskyy and Putin; it requires the involvement and initiative of a strong third party to halt the ongoing devastation,” she said.
On Friday, the White House announced that First Lady Melania Trump had helped broker a temporary ceasefire in Oleshky, a Russian-occupied town in southern Ukraine’s Kherson region, to permit humanitarian aid deliveries, demining operations, and civilian evacuations.
An estimated 1,700 to 2,000 people remain in the devastated front-line town, many facing severe shortages of food, medicine, and other essentials.
The White House said the ceasefire would begin on October 29, though Ukrainian and Russian officials indicated that operations could start on October 27.
Pope Leo also reportedly spoke with Zelenskyy and Putin about the humanitarian crisis, Vatican News reported.
First Lady Melania Trump visits the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art in Washington, D.C., on September 24, 2026, during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit to the United States. (Finn Gomez/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
“Melania Trump has become synonymous with being a savior and a hero for brokering the Oleshky deal,” Mendel said. “This will save around 2,000 people—something neither Ukraine nor Russia could have resolved for months.”
“This demonstrates that where two men are fighting, a woman can save lives,” she added.
“This new approach shows that peace should focus on human lives, not maps and territories,” she said.
Mendel also criticized the influence of Zelenskyy’s longtime ally Andriy Yermak on his diplomatic approach, arguing that the Ukrainian president has favored confrontation over compromise.
“Mr. Yermak taught Zelenskyy to be a strongman in diplomacy. What we see today is diplomacy that does not exist,” she said.
“It is a diplomacy of humiliation, constant threats, and demands,” Mendel added.
