Russian President Vladimir Putin has continued to frustrate President Donald Trump‘s administration as the Kremlin dodged ending the invasion of Ukraine.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that Putin “remains open to contact with President Trump,” but the government is “primarily” focused on generating a friendlier relationship with the United States rather than specifically addressing Ukraine’s fate.
“We continue working with the American side, primarily on rebuilding our bilateral relations, which suffered significant damage during the previous administration,” Peskov said.
Peskov acknowledged that the government is “also working on the implementation of some ideas related to the Ukrainian settlement” but explicitly warned the situation would take considerable time.
“This work is underway, but so far, there are no specifics that we could or should tell you about,” he said. “This is a time-consuming process, probably due to its complexity.”
Russia has been stalling progress on peace for weeks despite a landmark phone call between Trump and Putin this month. Preliminary negotiations in Saudi Arabia, which were thought at the time to be a breakthrough, also failed to make progress in ending the grueling conflict.
The Kremlin walked back its agreement to establish a maritime ceasefire on the Black Sea last week, saying Western nations must first lift their economic sanctions.
Officials are also cementing their demand for a new government in Ukraine before committing to peace, suggesting a “transitional” government overseen by the United Nations before national elections to replace Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Putin’s nitpicking on the deal has infuriated Trump, who complained in a Sunday NBC News phone interview that “new leadership [in Ukraine] means you’re not gonna have a deal for a long time.”
“If we’re in the midst of a negotiation, you could say that I was very angry, pissed off, when Putin said yesterday […] when Putin started getting into Zelensky’s credibility because that’s not going in the right location, you understand?” Trump said.
Finland President Alexander Stubb told Sky News in an interview published Monday that he noticed a “combination of impatience and a tad of frustration” during a golf game with Trump over the weekend.
“We were talking a lot about the ceasefire and the frustrations he had that Russia was not committing to it,” Stubb said. “If there was a pendulum of trust and distrust, certainly Russian activity in the past few weeks has proven that we’re moving more towards the distrust side of things.”
Stubb, who called Trump “the only person who can broker a peace, a ceasefire, because he’s the only one that Putin is afraid of,” said the West must apply “a colossal amount of sanctions on Apr. 20 if the Russians don’t abide by the ceasefire.”
He said he is confident Trump would follow through on such a penalty.
During his presidential campaign, Trump promised to end the Russian invasion of Ukraine on Day One. The president admitted on March 14 that the promise was a “bit sarcastic,” but his actions and rhetoric have affirmed a desire to wrap up the war as soon as possible.
He has continued to threaten heavier sanctions on natural resources to compel the Kremlin to take peace talks seriously.
“If Russia and I are unable to make a deal on stopping the bloodshed in Ukraine, and if I think it was Russia’s fault — which it might not be — but if I think it was Russia’s fault, I am going to put secondary tariffs on oil, on all oil coming out of Russia,” Trump said Sunday.
However, Russian leaders have shown no interest in stopping the bloodshed, with Putin suggesting peace may not be necessary as his nation’s military continues to overwhelm the beleaguered and exhausted Ukrainians.
“Along the entire front line, our forces have the strategic initiative,” the Russian president said Thursday, according to translations from the AFP. “I was saying not so long ago — ‘We will finish them off.’ There are reasons to believe that we will finish them off.”
Zelensky, who was once the main recipient of Trump’s ire over perceived unwillingness to negotiate for peace, has desperately pleaded with the president and other world leaders to treat Russia with the same hostility, saying Putin is “looking for excuses to drag this war out even further.”
“For several weeks now, there has been a U.S. proposal for an unconditional ceasefire. And almost every day, in response to this proposal, there are Russian drones, bombs, artillery shelling, and ballistic strikes,” Zelensky said Monday in a video posted to social media. “Russia deserves increased pressure—all the tough measures that can break its capacity to wage war and sustain the system that wants nothing but war.”
During his feud with Trump, Zelensky said he would be willing to step down from office if his leadership was seen as an impediment to peace. However, he said he is not willing to entertain such demands from Russia, which views his presidency as an obstruction to retroactively justifying its costly war.
“If you negotiate with Ukraine’s current leadership, you cannot keep calling it a ‘Nazi regime’ because you would have to engage with that regime,” a Russian diplomat told the Moscow Times.
While Trump has largely laid off Zelensky after the two agreed to hash out a rare earth mineral deal, that agreement has hit a rough patch due to disputes over the granular details.
Zelensky affirmed Thursday that the countries were on the same page for a “framework agreement” but complained the final draft “has been changed several times.”
“But I would not want the U.S. to have a feeling that Ukraine is against it in general,” Zelensky clarified. “We have consistently shown our positive signals. We are for cooperation with the United States.”
Trump scolded his Ukrainian counterpart during a press gaggle aboard Air Force One on Sunday, accusing him of “trying to back out of the rare earth deal.”
“If he does that, he’s got some problems. Big, big problems,” Trump said. “We made a deal on rare earth and now he’s saying, ‘Well, you know, I want to renegotiate the deal.’”
“He wants to be a member of NATO. Well, he was never going to be a member of NATO. He understands that. So if he’s looking to renegotiate the deal, he’s got big problems,” he added.
For now, the Russian government is biding time and has continued to conduct battlefield operations as if peace is not on the horizon.
The South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff announced Thursday that their intelligence showed North Korea deployed approximately 4,000 more soldiers from the Korean People’s Army to aid Russia in the invasion.
RUSSIA RENEGES ON BLACK SEA CEASEFIRE, SAYS WESTERN SANCTIONS MUST FIRST BE LIFTED
North Korea has also continued to send its ally short-range ballistic missiles, rocket launchers, and self-propelled guns for use on the front lines.
Trump indicated to a White House pool reporter Friday that he has not spoken with Putin about Russian purchases of munitions from North Korea and Iran.