WASHINGTON (Dispatches) – President Donald Trump says the United States will “take a pass” on brokering further Ukraine war talks unless there is quick progress from Moscow and Kyiv.
Trump was speaking after Secretary of State Marco Rubio commented -- following talks with European allies -- that Washington would “move on” if a truce did not seem “doable” within days.
“Yeah very shortly,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office when asked to confirm what Rubio had said. “No specific number of days, but quickly. We want to get it done.”
Trump refused to cast blame on either Russian President Vladimir Putin, who ordered the February 2022 full-scale war on pro-Western Ukraine, or Ukrainian President Voloydmyr Zelensky. But he insisted both sides had to make progress.
“Now if for some reason one of the two parties makes it very difficult, we’re just going to say: ‘You’re foolish. You’re fools. You’re horrible people’ -- and we’re going to just take a pass,” Trump said.
“But hopefully we won’t have to do that.”
In another development, Bloomberg reported early Saturday morning that the U.S. could recognize Crimea as Russian territory as part of a potential peace deal between Moscow and Kiev, citing people familiar with the matter.
The region voted to secede from Ukraine and rejoin Russia in 2014 shortly after the U.S.-backed coup in Kiev.
Ukrainian authorities have refused to recognize Moscow’s sovereignty over the peninsula, which is predominantly ethnically Russian, and have long insisted on restoring their country’s 1991 borders.
Bloomberg cited its sources as saying that the White House has not yet made a final decision on the matter.
The top U.S. negotiator, Steve Witkoff, said after a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week that the talks hinged on the status of Crimea and four other Russian regions claimed by Kiev.
According to Bloomberg, the U.S. presented its European allies on Thursday with a plan to freeze the fighting along the current front line and ease sanctions on Moscow as part of a ceasefire.
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday announced an Easter truce in the conflict in Ukraine starting this evening and lasting till midnight on Sunday.
“Today from 1800 (1500 GMT) to midnight Sunday (2100 GMT Sunday), the Russian side announces an Easter truce,” Putin said in televised comments, while meeting Russian chief of staff Valery Gerasimov.
Easter, a major holiday for Christians, is celebrated on Sunday.
“I order for this period to stop all military action,” Putin said.
“We are going on the basis that the Ukrainian side will follow our example, while our troops must be ready to resist possible breaches of the truce and provocations by the enemy, any aggressive actions,” Putin said.