President Donald Trump is moving ahead with a fresh set of sanctions against Russia after being forced to admit his Ukrainian peace plan is dead and buried.
Speaking with reporters, Trump said he plans to talk to Putin “over the next couple of days” in a last-ditch attempt to reach an agreement to end the war in Ukraine, which the president bragged about resolving on “day one” of his presidency on the campaign trail
“Look, we’re going to get it done,” Trump said Sunday. “The Russia-Ukraine situation. We’re going to get it done.”
Although Trump claims to be meeting with “certain European leaders” in Washington this week, there is nothing in his schedule to indicate that is the case.
Instead, the European Union’s sanctions envoy will meet with U.S. officials on Monday to discuss imposing stricter sanctions on Russia.
When asked if he was ready to move on to the next round of sanctions against Russia on Sunday, Trump replied, “Yeah, I am,” without elaborating.
Despite Trump’s bullish exterior, a sense of gloom is setting in behind the scenes as “the optimism post-Alaska and post-European meeting is gone,” a White House source told Politico’s Playbook.
Privately, there is little reason to believe Russia will make any further concessions, especially after Putin’s public show of strength with China’s Xi Jinping and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un last week, and Trump’s hope of organizing a summit between the Russian leader and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is fading fast. It’s “hard to see much forward momentum,” the source added.
During a summit in Russia last week, Putin stated that he has “little interest” in meeting with Zelensky and would only meet with the Ukrainian president if the meeting were to take place in Moscow, which the Ukrainian president has deemed unacceptable.
“Putin can come to Kyiv,” Zelensky said in response. “I believe that if you want the meeting not to take place, you should invite me to Moscow.”
Putin also claimed that any foreign troops deployed in Ukraine before a peace deal is reached would be considered “legitimate targets,” frustrating European efforts to deploy a peacekeeping force to the frontlines to provide security guarantees for Ukraine in the event of a ceasefire.
“If any troops appear there, especially now, during the fighting, we assume that they will be legitimate targets for destruction,” Putin said on Friday. “And if decisions are reached that will lead to peace, to long-term peace, then I simply see no point in their presence on Ukrainian territory.”
Trump also said he was “not thrilled” with Russia’s latest round of missile attacks over the weekend, which saw mass numbers of drones launched on Ukraine’s capital and damage to the country’s Cabinet of Ministers building in the heart of Kyiv—the first time a major parliamentary building has been struck since the start of the war.
“I am not thrilled with what’s happening there,” Trump said. “I believe we’re going to get it settled. But I am not happy with them. I’m not happy with anything having to do with that war.”
Ukraine has called for binding security guarantees as part of any peace deal, and has warned that without them, Russia will use the opportunity to regroup and attack again.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for further comment.
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