THE WASHINGTON POST: Talk of ceasefire and aid spurs hope in Ukraine, anger in Russia

KYIV - The resumption of U.S. aid and intelligence sharing following peace talks in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, has reignited hope in Kyiv that Washington is willing to be a partner in ending the war with Moscow, even as resistance to a ceasefire mounted in Russia and the Kremlin declined to immediately endorse the proposal.

Pro-Kremlin Russian analysts, politicians and nationalist military bloggers said Russia would probably reject the ceasefire as a trap that would harm Russian interests and benefit Ukraine.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that envoys were headed to Moscow with the proposal. “It’s up to Russia now,” he said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky - whom the Trump administration had accused of being unready for peace after last month’s contentious White House visit - described the meeting in a news conference Wednesday as “positive” and “constructive” and said it gave Ukraine a chance to signal to the United States its willingness for peace.

“We’re not planning on playing with the narrative that ‘we don’t want to end the war’ that Russia is spreading all over the world. For me, it’s important to end the war,” he said. “I want the president of the U.S. to see this, for Americans to see this and to feel this.”

He said that discussions included talk of returning prisoners and children and that the ceasefire would be a chance to work on a more comprehensive peace deal. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022.

The agreement would temporarily freeze more than 1,800 miles of front lines in their current position - where Russian forces appear to hold the upper hand - and the White House has appeared eager for a Kremlin endorsement. Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Waltz, discussed the proposal with his Russian counterpart on Wednesday, and special envoy Steve Witkoff will be dispatched to Moscow later this week, a spokeswoman said.

President Vladimir Putin has consistently stated that a temporary ceasefire would be unacceptable to Moscow. On Wednesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said only that Russia would not be “getting ahead of ourselves” and would scrutinize the ceasefire proposal and review the joint statement.

The bilateral talks in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday between Washington and Kyiv marked an improvement in the relationship between Ukraine and its most important backer, which had chilled in the aftermath of the disastrous Oval Office meeting. In a joint statement, the United States and Kyiv vowed to “immediately begin negotiations toward an enduring peace that provides for Ukraine’s long-term security.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who led the talks in Jeddah, said Wednesday: “We all eagerly await the Russian response, and we urge them strongly to consider ending all hostilities.”

He said if Russia answered positively, “then we know we’ve made real progress, and there’s a real chance of peace. If their response is no, it would be highly unfortunate, and it’ll make their intentions clear.”

“The ball is truly in their court,” Rubio added, as he traveled to a meeting of Group of Seven foreign ministers in Quebec.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina), a close ally of Trump, said that Zelensky had proved support for peace and that he was skeptical that Russia would accept the ceasefire.

“It is now up to Putin to show his cards. In order to move toward peace, I will be introducing bone-breaking sanctions and tariffs against Russia before the end of the week. If they do not pursue the ceasefire with the same vigor as Ukraine, there will be hell to pay,” he posted on X.

Putin ruled out a truce or temporary ceasefire in July, while insisting that “Russia stands for a complete and final end to the conflict,” which according to his conditions for peace would involve Ukraine’s demilitarization, neutrality and surrender of large chunks of territory. He maintained that a “truce or temporary ceasefire, or some kind of pause” would be used by Kyiv “to recover losses, regroup and rearm.”

Russian politicians, nationalists and military bloggers have expressed their opposition to a ceasefire. Even before the proposal was announced, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke against it on Tuesday.

Russian far-right ideologue Alexander Dugin, whose revanchist ideas are believed to influence Putin, said that Moscow would certainly reject the ceasefire proposal. He argued Wednesday on X that it would be contrary to what he sees as Trump’s ideology of a world in which great powers carve up the globe into spheres of influence.

“The present stand on ceasefire is inconsistent in face of the Great Powers World Order he himself advocates,” Dugin wrote, referring to Trump. “Knowing that a Russian answer to so-called ‘ceasefire’ will be decisive NO, warmongers from the International Deep State repeat this mantra that ‘the ball is on Russia’s side.’ That serves to justify the war. Another tricky trap for MAGA. Think better,” he wrote in another post.

In Kyiv, however, the atmosphere Tuesday was cautiously jubilant, despite air sirens echoing in the night - probably in retaliation for Ukraine’s massive drone attack on Moscow earlier in the week. In the city’s historic Independence Square, known as the Maidan, a few people walked past a makeshift memorial to fallen soldiers, some stopping to pay their respects. Sisters-in-law Karina and Oksana Harei wrote messages on small Ukrainian flags to add to the thousands speared in the damp spring soil.

“We are writing the names of our defenders,” Karina said. “Our friends, just people we know who defended us.” The war had been terrible, with too many people dying - including children - and she hoped it would end soon.

Nearby, Daryna Smilyanets also stopped in the square. “I’m trying to hold on, to believe in the best,” she said. “I want all this to be worthwhile and for it to end, for everyone to return, for those who are in captivity, for those who are fighting, for everyone to come home alive.”

Russian attacks on Ukraine continued overnight, killing five people - four in Odessa and one in Kryvyi Rih.

There has also been fierce fighting in Russia’s Kursk region, where Ukraine has been holding a steadily diminishing sliver of land that it hoped to use as a bargaining chip in negotiations. Russian state agencies posted a video of a Russian flag in Sudzha’s city center, an indication that the town might have fallen.

The Ukrainian military declined to answer questions about the situation in Sudzha, but in his briefing, Zelensky said the military in Kursk is “executing its tasks; the Russians are trying to push out our military as much as possible.”

On Tuesday, the deputy commander of a Ukrainian brigade that has been fighting in the Kursk region since January said the situation has rapidly deteriorated, that the Russians have “massed their forces very seriously” along the front line and “memorized all of our logistical routes.” The commander, who declined to provide his name or call signal because of security concerns, said it has become impossible for troops “to drive in or out from the territory of Kursk oblast to the territory of Ukraine” to resupply.

“Honestly,” he said, “slowly and slowly they pushed us to the point that we couldn’t put up a fight there any longer.” It was unclear, however, how many Ukrainian troops remain in the enclave.

Russia’s successes there and slow advances elsewhere along the front are why Moscow should not agree to the proposed ceasefire, said Sen. Konstantin Kosachyov, deputy speaker of Russia’s upper house of parliament.

“Russia is on the offensive, so things will be different with Russia. Any agreements, with understanding for the need for compromises, will be reached on our terms, not American. This is not boasting, but an understanding that real agreements are still being written there, at the front. Washington also needs to realize that,” he wrote on Telegram.

Konstantin Malofeev, a conservative tycoon with ties to the Kremlin, claimed on Telegram that Russian fighters had “unfurled the Imperial flag in the center of Sudzha.”

“They unfurled it calmly, confidently, in the middle of the square. That’s all you need to know about ‘30-day truces,’ ‘freezing the conflict,’ ‘NATO peacekeeping forces.’ Only Russia can end the war and only on its own terms,” he wrote.

In Kyiv, though, the troubles on the front were largely eclipsed by the outcome of the Jeddah meeting, which “exceeded the most optimistic expectations,” Ukrainian political analyst Volodymyr Fesenko wrote on Facebook, positing that Trump was aiming for a ceasefire by Easter. The question, he said, was how the Kremlin would respond.

“For Putin, there is a difficult dilemma - Ukraine or Trump,” Fesenko said. “Just yesterday, he must have hoped to get both, with Trump’s help to bend Ukraine to surrender, eventually restore control of Ukraine, and in parallel agree with Trump on various tactical and possibly strategic issues. And now he will have to choose.”

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Dixon reported from Riga, Latvia. Ed Ram in Kyiv, Natalia Abbakumova in Riga, Mary Ilyushina in Berlin and John Hudson in Shannon, Ireland, contributed to this report.

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