The United States and its G7 partners have warned Moscow that it could extend sanctions and use frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine, while Donald Trump seeks to win Vladimir Putin to his cease-fire proposal.
After a week in which Kyiv signed up for the 30 -day truce, but Moscow reported a reluctance to do so immediately, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his counterparts obtained a certain degree of unit on Friday by eliminating a joint declaration on the possible stages against Russia.
Their press release, published after a G7 meeting in Canada, noted that foreign ministers have discussed new sanctions if the Kremlin did not fully implement cease-fire.
Asked about American sanctions, Rubio warned that Trump “did not want to do it for the moment, because he is hoping to attract people on both sides in a process where we can negotiate peace.”
He added that he was not yet clear if Russia played for time.
“The question is: we really turn to a ceasefire, or is it a delay tactic?” said the Secretary of State. “I will not answer this because I cannot characterize this for you for you.”
The G7 press release said the ministers had discussed possible measures against Moscow such as “oil prices, as an additional support for Ukraine and other means”, notably using Russian assets Frozen.
The G7 froze around 300 billion euros in the assets of the Central Bank of Russia – mainly cash obligations and government obligations – in 2022 after the large -scale invasion of Moscow Ukraine.
Rubio, who previously indicated that kyiv should make territorial concessions, said Moscow should also do.
“I have never heard President Trump say that Russia has the right to take all of Ukraine and do what they want there,” he said.
He added that Trump’s national security team will meet this weekend after President Steve Witkoff will return from Moscow to examine the Russian position.
Trump said in an article on his Truth social network that the day before discussions with Putin had been “good and productive”.
Until this week, the new administration focused on kyiv’s pressure to agree on a rapid end to war, but the doubts expressed by Putin on an immediate ceasefire attracted attention to Moscow.
“The ball is now at the Russian court with regard to Ukraine,” the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada, Mélanie Joly, told journalists on Friday, adding that there was a “strong G7 unit” on Ukraine.
An official said that the text of the press release on Ukraine was the subject of tense struggles overnight. The United States has argued that strong language could disrupt talks with Russia and has been watered down to reach an agreement, they said.
kyiv and his allies in Great Britain and France wanted to overcome a disastrous meeting last month between Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy by putting measures against Russia on the American agenda.
The government of Zelenskyy agreed with Trump’s proposal this week after the United States has suspended military assistance and information sharing with kyiv – both from Washington now says that it has resumed.
On the other hand, Putin said he had supported a ceasefire but added that “problems” remained that were to be discussed first.
Its reluctance to support the cease-fire proposal comes when Russian forces have made significant progress in the Kursk region, where Ukraine has grasped more than 1,000 km2 of Russia last summer.
In his social article of truth, Trump said that the Russian army had surrounded thousands of Ukrainian troops, adding that “I strongly asked President Putin that their lives be spared”.
The general staff of Ukraine denied that Ukrainian troops had been surrounded and said that the fighting was still underway in the Kursk region.
Putin said on Friday that Ukrainian Kursk troops are expected to go “to make Trump’s call” while Zelenskyy rejected Moscow’s position on a cease-fire as Stalling tactics.
“The devil is in detail, and they will start to offer you details to train in a dialogue, delay certain processes and postpone the end of the war,” said the Ukrainian president. He added that he hoped for a “strong reaction” from Trump to Putin’s position.
Zelenskyy also said that the question of Ukrainian territories occupied by Russian forces would be “the most difficult” to be resolved.
The ceasefire and the territories “are the most difficult moments [of a negotiation]”He said.
“The first is difficult because it requires courage and political will, the second because it requires difficult dialogue.”
Europeans and the United States should coordinate the application of economic pressure on Putin. Friday, advisers to the national security of Great Britain, France and Germany were in Washington for interviews with Mike Waltz, their American counterpart.
France and Germany, which have long opposed a full crisis of assets held in the EU, now warm up at the idea and discuss with the United Kingdom and other ways they could be used.
Additional Max Seddon report in Berlin and George Parker in London
