President Donald Trump’s creative diplomacy in the Ukraine conflict – which entails bullying the victim and making unilateral concessions to the aggressor – has achieved its latest non-result. After a telephone conversation that lasted for an hour and a half, Trump failed to convince his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to accept the US proposal for an unconditional ceasefire. The war continues.
Putin attempted to dampen expectations shortly before the call. Speaking to a gathering of Russian businessmen earlier in the day, he predicted that sanctions on Russia would not go away. ‘These are not temporary or targeted measures; this is a mechanism of systemic, strategic pressure on our country,’ he said. Since sanctions relief is widely perceived to be an element of a potential settlement in Ukraine, Putin’s grim prediction suggested that he did not think a deal was on the cards.
Trump has put his peacemaker’s reputation on the line only to deliver practically nothing
As Putin has highlighted repeatedly since last December, when he first publicly broached the prospect of a ceasefire in Ukraine, any such truce would provide Ukraine with a breather.
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