Source : NEW INDIAN EXPRESS NEWS
U.S. officials have for the past few months urged Russia and Ukraine to reach a settlement, as Trump sought a swift end to Europe’s biggest conflict since World War II.
Trump said his talks with Putin on Monday were “excellent,” but European officials were skeptical about Russia’s intentions.
“Putin has never changed his position,” Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur said in Brussels on Tuesday. “Russia actually doesn’t want to end this war.”
The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said Russia’s failure to negotiate in good faith should trigger threatened U.S. sanctions.
“We really haven’t seen, you know, the pressure on Russia from these talks,” she told reporters.
Also, some were unconvinced by Putin’s promise to Trump that Russia is “ready to work with” Ukraine on a “memorandum” outlining the framework for “a possible future peace treaty.”
“It appears that Putin has devised a way to offer Trump an interim, tangible outcome from Washington’s peace efforts without making any real concessions,” Tatiana Stanovaya, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, said on X.
The warring countries are insisting on apparently irreconcilable conditions for peace, and even a temporary truce has been out of reach.
The first direct Russia-Ukraine peace talks since the early weeks of Moscow’s 2022 invasion ended after less than two hours last Friday, and while both sides agreed on a large prisoner swap, they clearly remained far apart on key conditions for ending the fighting.
SOURCE :- NEW INDIAN EXPRESS
