President Donald Trump of the United States has repeated the threat of potential sanctions against Russia if no substantial progress is made in the next two weeks in the direction of a peaceful solution in Ukraine.
“It will be a very important decision, and that is whether or not they are huge sanctions or mass rates or both, or we do nothing and say it is your fight,” Trump said Friday.
“I am not happy with it, and I am not happy that there is anything to do with that war,” Trump said reporters in the White House.
In the meantime, Ukrainian President VolodyMyr Zenskyy Moscow of actively hinded efforts accused a face-to-face dialogue between him and Putin.
Zenskyy has consistently advocated direct negotiations with the Kremlin leader and claims that a personal meeting is essential to put an end to the conflict.
Trump stated that he had initiated preliminary steps to arrange a top between Zenskyy and Putin after a telephone conversation with the Russian president on Monday, who came shortly after their Alaska meeting on August 15.
Zenskyy has accused Russia of blocking.
“The meeting is one of the components of how to end the war,” he said on Friday at a press conference in Kiev with NATO -Secretary General Mark Rutte. “And because they don’t want to end it, they will look for space for (avoid it).”
Agenda for Peace ‘not ready’, says Russia
In the meantime, the Russian Foreign Minister has said that preparations for a possible meeting between Zenskyy and Putin remain incomplete.
“Putin is ready to meet Zenskyy when the agenda would be ready for a top. And this agenda is not ready at all,” Sergei Lavrov told us-outlet NBC on Friday.
The statement repeated the established rhetoric of Moscow about the impossible that the meeting of a leaders was impossible, unless certain conditions were met.
Asked about his reaction to Lavrov’s comments and what the next steps are, Trump said earlier on Friday, reporters: “Well, we will see. We’ll see if Putin and Zenskyy work together a bit. It’s a little oil and vinegar.”
Trump had taken sanctions off the table in preparation for his top in Anchorage with Putin, but as fighting in Ukraine continues, that position could shift.
Thousands of Ukrainian citizens have been killed since the entire invasion of Russia in Ukraine began in 2022. Analysts estimate that since then more than a million soldiers have been killed or injured on both sides.
Trump, whose presidential elections in 2024 claimed that he could end the war in Russia-Ukraine in one day, has made various threats in the past to impose sanctions on Russia.
In anticipation of Trump’s recent meeting with Putin, he did not threaten -specified “serious consequences” when Russia did not agree to end the war, but removed those threats during their discussion in Alaska.
At the beginning of August, however, he mentioned the continuous import of Russian oil by India as a reason to impose a 25 percent rate on Indian goods.
He has not yet promised to impose secondary sanctions on other large Russian oil importers such as China, who only say that he could be “within two or three weeks” in mid-August.
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