The US secretary of state has suggested that the White House could abandon efforts to settle the conflict if it doesn’t see progress in the coming days
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has suggested that Washington could abandon efforts to find a peaceful resolution to the Ukraine conflict if it believes Moscow and Kiev are incapable of negotiating.
Speaking to reporters on Friday, Rubio commented on a meeting with representatives from Ukraine, France, Britain, and Germany in Paris the day before. He stated that while the talks on the Ukraine conflict were “constructive and helpful,” the White House is still waiting to see if a peace deal is “doable.”
Asked to comment on the ongoing negotiations, the secretary of state refused to comment on what is being discussed, but called it a “broad framework.”
He acknowledged that there will inevitably be differences between Russia and Ukraine, and that “no one is saying that this is going to get done in 12 hours.”
He explained that the US wants to see “whether those differences can even be narrowed and if it’s even possible to get movement within the period of time we have in mind.”
“We need to figure out here, now, within a matter of days, whether this is doable in the short term, because if it’s not, then I think we’re just going to move on,” Rubio said, adding that “this isn’t going to go on forever.”
Russian officials have expressed skepticism about the feasibility of a ceasefire with Ukraine, claiming that Kiev and its backers in Europe are actively undermining US peace efforts.
Moscow’s UN representative, Vassily Nebenzia, recently said that Kiev has repeatedly failed to adhere to a US-mediated moratorium on strikes against energy infrastructure.
He added that the West’s record of using purported peace deals to build up the Ukrainian military means that expectations for a full ceasefire are “simply unrealistic at this stage.”
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