How to give them Russia’s tactics an advantage in the US -led peace talks

Ukraine thought it had a deal in its place to suspend the fighting in the Black Sea immediately. Russia said economic sanctions will need to be lifted first. The United States did not address the issue of timing at all, just repeating President Trump’s request widely to stop the killing.

Analysts and experts said that the conflicting data that was issued this week after the intermediate aviation negotiations in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia stopped the newest of a chaotic process, as it seems that the Kremlin are playing for time and obtaining the upper hand.

The Trump administration has begun securing a series of ceasefire deals limited, on the pretext that modest agreements will pave the way for a broader truce and eventually a peace deal to end the conflict. But so far, these additional deals were largely a way to Russia to win concessions from Ukraine and the spirit of goodwill from the eager White House until it was seen as the peacemaker.

On Tuesday, Moscow said it would agree on Black Sea truce Only if the penalties are lifted on the Government Agriculture Bank, Rosselkhozbank, and other restrictions. Experts said that if Washington agreed to these conditions and pressure from European allies to do the same, the proposed black sea deal will benefit Moscow more than Kiev.

The Black Sea negotiations followed another limited agreement in which Washington mediated: stopping 30 days in Russia and Ukraine strikes against energy targets. This deal also states Moscow, given the comprehensive damage caused by Ukrainian strikes on oil and gas facilities throughout Russia, and it came with the absence of a clear implementation mechanism. The two sides quickly accused each other of continuing these strikes.

Earlier this month, President Vladimir F. Putin from Russia Effectively A 30 -day ceasefire suggestion from Washington and Kiev. Mr. Putin put the circumstances, including freezing on the employment of Ukrainian individuals, military training and weapons, which would have made Kiev especially weak they were fighting for appeal.

“It seems clear that the Russians are stopping, and they are very good at that,” said Daniel Farid, a former American diplomat and colleague in the Atlantic Council in Washington, who negotiated with the Russians in the past. “The Russians draw this and download it under circumstances to send us down a hole of complexity.”

On Tuesday, Mr. Trump admitted the Russian tactic without criticism. He said he believed that Moscow wants to see the end of the war, but they may run their feet.

Then he recalled taking the same approach to work negotiations in the past, when he did not want to sign a contract but wanted to “stay in the game.”

For Russia, staying in the conversations means raising a series of demands, but it is unlikely to be fulfilled. Russia framing the proposed Black Sea deal as a way to revive the uninterrupted 2022 deal, which gave it some control over commercial shipping across the sea.

This deal allowed Ukraine to export its pills through an agreed shipping corridor, but it also allowed Russia to search all commercial ships to ensure that weapons are not carrying. Experts say Russia has taken advantage of this ruling to stop exports by the Ukrainian Sea.

After the deal collapsed in 2023, Ukraine successfully pushed the Russian navy from the Western Black Sea to secure its shipping corridor. The process was so successful that the exports of the cereal conveyed by the sea Return to the levels close to the thermalAbove the levels reached during the time of the unnecessary deal.

Against that background, Kyiv is not interested in paying attention to Moscow’s demands, says experts. Mr. Farid indicated that in order to look at a black marine deal as a balanced, it will need to include a clear benefit to Kev, such as the Russians’ commitment to stop the attacks on the southern port of Odessa or in all Ukrainian agriculture export facilities.

The White House did not explicitly refer to such commitment in its statements on Tuesday, which indicated only to eliminate the “use of power” in the Black Sea.

The circumstances set by the Kremlin on Tuesday also presented the possibility of the United States to lift the sanctions as a condition for Russian action – a step that European Union leaders oppose firmly. When asked about the Black Sea negotiations on Wednesday, President Emmanuel Macron from France said that the concept of Mr. Trump on “peace through power” should not “begin to remove sanctions before receiving or verifying it.”

Mr. Farid said that he had not seen any fundamental concession on the Russian side that would deserve such a step.

Mr. Farid said: “The Russians were able to put this on the agenda, which means that they injected penalties lifted as part of the early negotiation process.” “Why is our interest in doing this? What is the mutual step that we will get from the Russians?”

Mr. Trump threatened Russia with consequences if you did not follow peace, but his administration has not yet followed it. Instead, she accepted and repeated Mr. Putin’s statements about the desire to end the conflict and talk about the capabilities of a renewed era of cooperation with Russia.

President Voludmir Zelinski of Ukraine said on Tuesday that the conditions of Moscow in the Black Sea deal were additional evidence that the Kremlin were looking for more concessions while deceiving the United States for its real intentions.

Mr. Putin has shown little signs of retreating his goal to subjugate Ukraine as a Satalian state under the thumb of Russia. He regularly said that the Russian forces are on the front foot in the battlefield and that the ceasefire will not only benefit Kiev. However, he wants to continue the Trump administration’s rapid convergence with Moscow, pointing to joint economic projects that Russia and the United States can follow.

The circumstances that Moscow put in the Black Sea agreement have a little opportunity to meet any time soon. The request to re -connect the Russian Government Agriculture Bank included the international payment system known as Swift. This requires the cooperation of European countries that have been cut from the talks.

Alexander Coleander, an older colleague at the European Policy Analysis Center, said that the removal of sanctions from the bank would lead to a great benefit to Moscow.

He said: “They definitely want a large bank owned by the country outside the sanctions, because at the moment you have a financial bank, you can do what you want.” “They can allow transactions; they can transfer money between countries; they can pay the costs of imports in dollars, which is always cheaper; they can get their exports dollars.”

Even if Moscow, Washington and Kiev resolved the differences in its statements about the Black Sea deal, the discussion ceasefire will not do more than just devoting the current situation, said Andrei Cisov, director of the company Sovecon, a agricultural market analysis company.

Mr. Sezov indicated that Ukraine has successfully exported the grains across the Black Sea since late 2023, and that Russia has exported both oil and grains, although restrictions have made the activity more expensive for Moscow. He sees the current talks as a formal character in the current ranking.

“It is not a step forward,” he said. “In my view, it appears that progress towards a full truce, towards a complete ceasefire, is very limited, if any.”

continuous She contributed to the reports from Kyiv, Ukraine.