Moscow, Russia – Reuters news agency quoted sources close to the Kremlin on Tuesday as saying that Russian President Vladimir Putin refuses to comply with the threat of his American counterpart, Donald Trump, to impose sanctions if the deadline he set for him to end the war in Ukraine, which ends on Friday, expires.
According to the agency, the sources expected that Putin would stick to the goal of complete control over four regions in Ukraine.
Trump threatened to impose new sanctions on Russia, and impose 100 percent customs duties on countries that buy its oil, the largest of which are China and India, unless the Russian president agrees to a ceasefire in Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Sources familiar with discussions in the Kremlin said that Putin’s determination to continue stems from his belief that Russia will win, and his belief that any new sanctions will not have a significant impact after successive waves of economic sanctions since the start of the war, three and a half years ago.
The sources explained that Putin does not want to anger Trump, and realizes that he may waste an opportunity to improve relations with Washington and the West, but his war goals are a priority.
She noted that Putin’s goal is to gain complete control over the Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia, and Kherson regions of Ukraine, which Russia claims as its territory, and then discuss a peace agreement.
She explained that “the current talks, in which Russian and Ukrainian negotiators have met three times since May, were an attempt by Moscow to convince Trump that Putin does not reject peace, adding that the talks were devoid of any real content except for discussions of humanitarian exchanges.”
White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said: “President Trump wants to stop the killings, which is why he sells American-made weapons to NATO members, and threatens Putin with tariffs and harsh sanctions if he does not agree to a ceasefire”.
