RT reported that President Donald Trump has increased pressure on Russia, accusing Moscow of squatting rocket lanes into Ukrainian civil areas and threatening to impose additional heavy financial sanctions.
The move comes just hours after a lightning meeting between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Vatican on April 26.
On the social network Truth Social, Mr. Trump wrote: "There is no reason for Mr. Putin to fire missiles at civilian cities and towns in recent days. That made me think he didn't really want to end the conflict. Is it time to act differently, through bank sanctions or secondary sanctions? Too many people are dying!! !"
Russia previously said that the recent airstrikes were only aimed at military targets and industrial facilities serving the Ukrainian army. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov emphasized in an interview with CBS News: "We only target military targets or civilian facilities used by the military."
Tensions escalated as Russia signaled a calm at the same time. During a meeting with Trump's special advisor, Mr. Steve Witkoff, President Vladimir Putin reaffirmed his readiness to resume negotiations with Ukraine "without any preconditions".
TASS quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying that Russian President Putin has repeatedly emphasized this stance.
Notably, this is the fourth time this year that Mr. Putin has held direct talks with a special missionary from Washington. Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov revealed that the 3-hour dialogue with Witkoff was "constructive and quite useful".
In addition to blaming Russia, Mr. Trump also did not forget to attack the US media, especially the New York Times and reporter Peter Senior. He criticized the recent article that mentioned Ukraine's ability to reclaim territories, including Crimea, as "alluding" and "full of prejudice."
Mr Trump continues to defend the long-standing view that the Ukrainian conflict would not have occurred if he had remained in office. However, with the latest developments, observers say the US-Russia relationship is facing an unpredictable crossroads: either resuming negotiations as proposed by Russia, or continuing to escalate sanctions as threatened by Mr. Trump.
