US President Donald Trump said on Monday that he is “disappointed” with Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s lack of progress towards a ceasefire and would shorten the planned 50-day ultimatum for Moscow as a result.
“I’m going to make a new deadline: 10 or 12 days from today. There is not reason for waiting,” he said.
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Trump issued an ultimatum to Putin on July 14 to move toward a ceasefire within a 50-day timeframe or face crushing sanctions and secondary tariffs. The original deadline is set to expire in September.
But on Monday, Trump said he would shorten the ultimatum, citing continued Russian attacks despite his warning – and Putin’s refusal to heed his call for peace.
Speaking alongside British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Trump said he thought he “had a deal” with Putin to end the war multiple times, only that they never materialized as Moscow continued to launch attacks on Ukraine.
“I’ve spoken to President Putin a lot. I got along with him very well. But five times, every time – four times maybe, but we’ve had discussions – you and I’ve had discussions,” Trump said while gesturing to Starmer to his right.
“We thought we had that settled numerous times, and then President Putin goes out and starts launching rockets into some city, like Kyiv, and kills a lot of people in a nursing home, or whatever yeah, bodies lying all over the streets,” Trump continued.
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Russia launched hundreds of drones across Ukraine on Monday morning, with a Russian guided aerial bomb killing one and destroying a medical clinic in Kharkiv a few days prior.
The attacks have irked Trump, as suggested by his speech.
“That’s not the way to do it, so we’ll see what happens with that. I’m very disappointed. I’m disappointed in President Putin, very disappointed in him,” he added.
“So we’re gonna have to look… and I’m gonna reduce that 50 days I gave him to… to a lesser number, because I think I already know the answer of what’s gonna happen.”
A day prior, US State Secretary Marco Rubio said Trump is “losing his patience” with Putin, with Rubio also accusing Russia of employing “delay tactics” to prolong the war.
Rubio also alluded to Beijing’s tacit support for Moscow that enabled the latter to prolong the Ukraine invasion. Rubio suggested that China has an incentive for the war to continue, a stance Beijing reportedly acknowledged behind closed doors during a high-level meeting with the EU.
Trump has vowed to end the war in Ukraine before his re-election – an ongoing attempt since his return to office in January this year.
Despite multiple phone calls with Putin and multiple meetings between Kyiv and Moscow – at times mediated by the US – none of them have yielded the ceasefire Trump intended.
After Putin reportedly conveyed Moscow’s maximalist position during his most recent call with Trump, the latter had ostensibly taken a U-turn on Ukraine, lifting restrictions on weapons aid and vowing to send more to Kyiv.
Despite the shift in stance, some retired US military colonels voiced concerns that the scale of aid being sent to Kyiv was “insufficient” in an interview with Kyiv Post.
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