Key events
The Guardian’s defence and security editor, Dan Sabbagh, has this snippet about the ineffectiveness of Trump’s negotiating tactics in regards to trying to end the war in Ukraine. You can read the full story here.
During the election campaign, Trump had said that he could end the Ukraine war within 24 hours, comments he more recently claimed were “a little bit sarcastic”.
That has proved elusive and his tactics to force Russia and Ukraine into agreeing a ceasefire have so far been focused on bullying and pressurising Kyiv.
Trump and his vice-president, JD Vance, berated Zelenskyy at the Oval Office a month ago, which was followed by Washington cutting off intelligence and military aid.
Kyiv then signed up to the principle of a 30-day ceasefire if the Kremlin would reciprocate in return for intelligence and aid being restored.
Putin said earlier this month that although he was in favour of a ceasefire, “there are nuances” and any halt in fighting should “remove the root causes of this crisis”, a sweeping but vague demand.
The Russian president and his allies have called for the demilitarisation of Ukraine, insisted that the presence of western troops as peacekeepers would be unacceptable and demanded the full annexation of four regions, three of which it only partially occupies.
Trump says he is ‘very angry’ with Putin’s approach to ceasefire as strikes on Ukraine continue
Welcome back to our live coverage of Russia’s war on Ukraine. We are leading today’s blog with Donald Trump saying he was “very angry” and “pissed off” over Vladimir Putin’s approach to a ceasefire in Ukraine, in comments that mark a huge shift in tone in the way the US president usually speaks about the Russian leader.
Trump also took aim at the Russian president’s criticism of Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s credibility, despite the US President having previously called his Ukrainian counterpart a “dictator”.
Putin recently said that Zelenskyy – who was democratically elected in 2019 – lacks the legitimacy to sign a peace deal and suggested that Ukraine needed external governance.
Trump, who is eager for Kyiv and Moscow to swiftly agree to a broad ceasefire deal, indicated he would levy a 25% or 50% tariff that would affect countries buying Russian oil in a telephone interview with NBC News.
“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.
“That would be that if you buy oil from Russia, you can’t do business in the United States. There will be a 25% tariff on all … on all oil, a 25 to 50-point tariff on all oil.”
Trump continued: “I was very angry, pissed off” when Putin “started getting into Zelenskyy’s credibility, because that’s not going in the right location, you understand?”
He said “new leadership means you’re not gonna have a deal for a long time, right” and that he wanted to exert pressure on the Kremlin, which has only agreed to limited maritime and energy ceasefires so far.
Seemingly responding to Trump’s comments, Zelenskyy said in his Sunday night address that Putin “does not care about diplomacy”, adding that attacks have continued to attack his country despite ceasefire proposals (being suggested by Washington over recent weeks).
“For several weeks now, there has been a US proposal for an unconditional ceasefire. And almost every day, in response to this proposal, there are Russian drones, bombs, artillery shelling and ballistic strikes,” the Ukrainian president said.
“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,” Zelensky added.
In some other developments:
-
Donald Trump said Volodymyr Zelenskyy wants to back out of a critical minerals deal, which would grant the US access to Ukraine’s rare mineral reserves.
“He’s trying to back out of the rare earth deal and if he does that he’s got some problems, big, big problems,” Trump told reporters yesterday.
“He wants to be a member of Nato, but he’s never going to be a member of Nato. He understands that.” -
Russia bombed the city of Kharkiv in north-eastern Ukraine for the second night in a row, injuring two people, sparking fires and damaging a kindergarten and private houses, Ukrainian officials said early on Monday. The attacks lasted most of the night, said Kharkiv’s mayor, Ihor Terekhov. Zelenskyy on Sunday said Moscow had fired more than 1,000 drones in the past week and called for a response from the US and other allies.
-
Russia’s defence ministry claimed on Sunday that its forces had gained control over Zaporizhzhia settlement in Ukraine’s Donetsk region. The village is unrelated to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, which is in another region. The Russian claim was reported by Reuters, which said it was not able to verify it. The village is 7km from the border of Ukraine’s central Dnipropetrovsk region. The Donetsk region borders Dnipropetrovsk to the east.
-
The Ukrainian air force said Russia launched 131 drones and two ballistic missiles during overnight attacks, 57 of which were shot down and another 45 drones did not reach their targets, likely due to electronic countermeasures. The military did not specify what happened to the remaining 29 drones.
-
Russia’s air defence units intercepted and destroyed 66 Ukrainian drones overnight, the Russian defence ministry said this morning. 41 of the drones were destroyed over the border Bryansk region, 24 over the Kaluga region and one over the Kursk region. There were no immediate reports of any casualties.
