Russia-Ukraine peace talks are “more on pause” than they are lively, the Kremlin said Friday, in an acknowledgement that confirms what Ukraine has been warning for months – negotiations are faltering regardless of a push from US President Donald Trump.
“The channels of communication exist and are established; our negotiators are able to use them to communicate. However, at the moment, it’s fair to say things are more on pause than active interaction,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov instructed reporters throughout an everyday briefing name. “It’s important not to wear rose-tinted glasses or expect that the negotiation process will deliver lightning-fast results.”
“I want to remind you of President Trump’s own words: at first, he thought it could be settled quickly, but later realized it would take more time,” Peskov said, including that Russia “remains committed to pursuing peaceful dialogue.”
It comes as Ukraine has repeatedly warned that Russia isn’t genuinely taken with peace and accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of utilizing negotiations to purchase extra time for his financial system and struggle effort.
Ukrainian chief Volodymyr Zelensky said Friday that “everything possible must be done to take money away from Russia’s war machine,” as he thanked the United Kingdom for a new sanctions bundle focusing on Moscow’s shadow fleet of oil tankers and its army provide chains. Japan additionally imposed additional sanctions on Russian firms on Friday and joined the international locations implementing a value cap on Russian oil, which goals to scale back the Kremlin’s income.
“This is the only way to stop Russia and end this war,” Zelensky added.
The Trump administration’s efforts to dealer a peace deal and interact immediately in talks with Putin have thus far amounted to nothing substantial.
Russia has continued to ramp up assaults on Ukraine, including on civilians, at the same time as Putin met with Trump in Alaska and glad-handed different US officers.
This week, tensions reached a brand new degree as NATO fighter jets scrambled to shoot down a number of Russian drones that violated Polish airspace on Wednesday.
And Russia launched its largest-ever aerial assault on Ukraine final weekend, after which the top of Ukraine’s presidential workplace, Andriy Yermak, reiterated Kyiv’s long-held perception: “Putin understands only force and has no intention of stopping this war… Pressure on Russia must continue.”
Trump said on Friday that his endurance with Putin was “running out fast.”
He as soon as once more previewed the opportunity of hitting Russia “very hard” with a second part of sanctions towards Moscow however provided no timeline for imposing extra measures.
Administration officers beforehand instructed NCS the president is growing increasingly frustrated with the shortage of tangible progress in peace talks to finish the struggle. At the identical time, Trump is dealing with extra pressure from the Senate to transfer ahead with sanctions.
“I think Russia is playing, they’re really playing us like a piano right now,” North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, the co-chair of the Senate NATO Observer Group, said earlier this week.
“(Putin has) gotten everything he wanted; he’s gotten access to the president, he’s getting a red-carpet reception, three weeks later he’s getting a red carpet reception from Xi Jinping and hanging out with Kim Jong Un,” Tillis said, including that the Russian chief’s purpose is to “string us along.”
Emily Ferris, a senior analysis fellow on the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), a British assume tank, said acknowledging that peace talks are “on pause” is new language from the Kremlin, nevertheless it matches into an previous narrative. Russia is trying to paint Ukraine because the unreasonable celebration in negotiations, Ferris said.
“And what you see really, since the Alaska Summit, is maximalist demands from Moscow about territory that Ukraine is highly unlikely to give in to, or the Americans would be highly unlikely to tolerate,” she instructed NCS. “There’s no real reason for Russia to come to the table at all.”
“I think the Russians are sort of probing how far they can go with the Americans,” Ferris added. “They’re not quite sure what will trigger debilitating sanctions on Russia, because that is one of the last sticks that the Americans have.”
The Kremlin, in the meantime, has additionally forged blame on Europe for creating obstacles to peace.
But Moscow has overtly rejected proposals from Kyiv’s European allies to contribute to a possible peacekeeping drive in Ukraine if a ceasefire deal is finalized. Russian officers have repeatedly refused to countenance troops from any NATO nation on Ukrainian soil.
Peskov on Friday additionally defended the joint army workout routines that Russia is holding with Belarus this week, referred to as Zapad-2025. The Kremlin spokesman said issues in regards to the workout routines are due to Western Europe’s “openly hostile stance toward us” and “heightened emotions.”