Putin doubts potency of Trump’s ultimatum to end the war, sources say

Darya Korsunskaya, Andrew Osborn and Mark Trevelyan

Moscow (Reuters) -Rusia President Vladimir Putin, this Friday, an end to a sanction ultimatum ending from US President Donald Trump, and the resources close to the Kremlin to Reuters, a statement to the fully target of capture the four regions of Ukraine.

Trump threatened Russia with new sanctions, and Putin threatened the largest oil to apply 100% tariffs to China and India, unless Russia agreed to buy a ceasefire in Ukraine’s war in Ukraine.

Putin’s determination to continue is encouraged by the belief that Russia has won and the three sources familiar with the debates in the Kremlin, with skepticism that more US sanctions will have a lot of effect after 3-1/2 years of war.

He doesn’t want to angry Russian leader Trump and realized that he could give the chance to improve relations with Washington and the West, but he said that war goals were priority.

Putin’s aim is to fully capture the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, which Russia claims, and to talk about a peace agreement.

“Putin could have claimed that the war for Russia had achieved its goals.” He said.

He said that the current process of negotiations, where Russian and Ukrainian negotiators have met three times since May, was an attempt to convince Moscow that Trump did not refuse Putin’s peace.

Russia says it is serious to accept a long -term peace in negotiations, but the process is complex because the postures of the two sides are too far. Putin described the talks as positive last week.

Among the demands of Moscow are the withdrawal of a full ukraine from the four regions and the demands of Kiev’s neutral status and military -sized borders – rejected by Ukraine.

In a sign that there may be an opportunity to make an agreement before the deadline date, after Trump’s special ambassador Steve Witkoff visited Russia this week and a climb on the risks of nuclear war risks between Trump and Moscow. On Monday, Russia said it is no longer connected by a moratorium on short and medium -range nuclear missiles.

Kremlin did not respond to the request for comments for this story. All sources spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the situation.

Trump, who praised Putin in the past and revealed the possibility of profitable business agreements between the two countries, has recently expressed increasing impatience with the Russian President. He complained about Putin’s “nonsense” and described Russia’s ruthless bombing of Kiev and other Ukraine cities as “disgusting”.

The Kremlin said Trump noted his statements, but refused to answer them.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydeno called on the world last week to answer the world with “maximum pressure” after killing Russia’s reaction to Trump’s last date.

“President Trump wants to stop killing, so NATO sells American weapons to NATO members and threatens Putin with biting tariffs and sanctions,” he said. He said.

Forces advance

The first source said Putin is particularly concerned about the recent deterioration of US ties. Putin still maintains the hope that Russia can be friends with America and trade with the West, and said “worrying about the irritation of Trump.

However, Putin does not believe that it is time to end the war, and the source, neither the Russian people nor the army stopped now.

Author Rodgers said Putin has invested his political reputation and heritage in the war in Ukraine.

“We know from his previous writings and explanations that he sees himself as part of a strong tradition against the West and the rest of the world to defend Russia’s interests.” He said.

The Kremlin leader Trump cares about the relationship and does not want to angry, but “only the most important priority – Putin, Trump wants to end the war because he wants.”

A third person who is familiar with the idea of the Kremlin said that Russia wanted to buy all four regions and did not see the logic of stopping in a period of war area earnings in Russia’s summer attack.

According to the Black Bird Group, a Finnish military analysis center, Ukraine has been subjected to some of the largest regional losses in 2025 in the last three months, including 502 kilometers in July. In total, Russia occupied one fifth of Ukraine.

Russian military personnel told Putin that the Ukrainian front will be disintegrated within two or three months.

However, Russia’s latest gains, a Washington -based thought tank, a June report from the Strategic and International Research Center, has been relatively small with only 5,000 square kilometers (1,930 miles of square) since the beginning of last year since the beginning of last year.

Ukraine and Western military sources acknowledge that Russia has earned, but only won with gradual and heavy losses. Russian war bloggers say that Moscow’s powers, land and intense urban landscape are switched throughout the current attack in areas where Ukraine prefers Ukraine, but other areas should take faster.

‘He made a threat before’

Trump’s threat of sanctions was “painful and unpleasant”, but he said it wasn’t a disaster. The third source said in Moscow that he feels that he felt that “there’s not much more to us”.

It was also unclear whether Trump would follow his ultimatum, this person said he had “threatened before” and then did not move or change his mind.

The source also said that it is difficult to imagine that China would stop buying Russian oil on Trump’s instructions and that its actions are at risk of recoiling by raising oil prices further.

According to the UN Trade data, as a result of previous sanction tours, Russian oil and gas exporters received great accuracy to their revenues, and foreign direct investment in the country fell by 63% last year. The presence of a central bank of approximately $ 300 billion in the fields of foreign judiciary has been frozen.

However, Russia’s ability to war was not blocked by imports from the imported components that maintain a major increase in weapon production from North Korea and the imports of weapons. Kremlin repeatedly said Russia has “immunity” for sanctions.

Trump accepted Russia’s ability to sweep measures. “They are quite good to avoid strange characters and sanctions, so we will see what will happen,” he said.

The first Russian source, Putin, while continuing the conflict, in March Washington in exchange for the full cease -fire agreement will remove the US sanctions, in 2014, the Crimea added from Ukraine in 2014 and since 2022 will accept the control of the verb and said that the land has been seized since 2022.

He called the source offer “a fantastic chance”, but he said it was much more difficult to stop a war than starting him.

(Reporting by Darya Korsunskaya and Andrew Osborn; Additional Reporting by Nandita Bose; Mark Trevelyan;