Home National News U.S. Sanctions on Russia Still Loom After Putin-Witkoff Meeting

U.S. Sanctions on Russia Still Loom After Putin-Witkoff Meeting

U.S. Sanctions on Russia Still Loom After Putin-Witkoff Meeting

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at looming U.S. sanctions on Russia, the White House doubling its tariff rate on India, and Colombia and Peru fighting over a disputed island.


The Efficacy of U.S. Threats

Russian President Vladimir Putin and White House envoy Steve Witkoff held “useful and constructive” talks in Moscow on Wednesday, according to Kremlin foreign-policy aide Yuri Ushakov. The roughly three-hour session aimed to secure a last-minute breakthrough to end the Russia-Ukraine war before threatened U.S. sanctions go into effect on Friday.

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at looming U.S. sanctions on Russia, the White House doubling its tariff rate on India, and Colombia and Peru fighting over a disputed island.


The Efficacy of U.S. Threats

Russian President Vladimir Putin and White House envoy Steve Witkoff held “useful and constructive” talks in Moscow on Wednesday, according to Kremlin foreign-policy aide Yuri Ushakov. The roughly three-hour session aimed to secure a last-minute breakthrough to end the Russia-Ukraine war before threatened U.S. sanctions go into effect on Friday.

This was the fifth time that Putin and Witkoff have spoken face to face this year. Few details of the meeting’s content have emerged thus far, though the Kremlin appears to be weighing new concession options, including a temporary air truce with Ukraine, Bloomberg reported.

Still, officials suggest that Wednesday’s meeting was not enough to prevent U.S. President Donald Trump from imposing sanctions on Moscow. “The Russians are eager to continue engaging with the United States,” a White House official said after the dialogue. But “the secondary sanctions are still expected to be implemented on Friday.”

Three weeks ago, Trump gave Russia 50 days to make progress toward securing a peace deal with Ukraine or else face further U.S. sanctions. But the U.S. president’s patience appears to be dwindling, and last week, he shortened that ultimatum to Aug. 8.

That change falls in line with the White House’s increasingly tougher stance on the Kremlin in recent weeks, with Trump threatening to impose 100 percent secondary tariffs on all countries that purchase oil from Russia (as well as doubling U.S. duties on India for doing so), agreeing last month to allow European nations to buy U.S.-made weapons for Ukraine, and repositioning two “nuclear” U.S. submarines closer to Russia following a veiled threat from former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev (though it remains unclear whether Trump meant nuclear-armed or nuclear-powered submarines, as the United States has both).

“It is extremely important that Moscow is beginning to feel the pressure of the world, the pressure from the United States, the threat of tougher sanctions for continuing the war,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky posted on X on Tuesday following a phone call with Trump, during which the two leaders discussed how U.S. sanctions could damage the Russian economy.

However, experts warn that Russia is unlikely to bow to U.S. threats when it feels that it is winning the war. Since Russia and Ukraine resumed direct peace talks in May, Moscow has conducted its heaviest air attacks yet, killing at least 72 people in Kyiv alone. On Wednesday, Zelensky also accused Russian forces of attacking a gas-pumping station in southern Ukraine that Kyiv called a deliberate blow to its preparations for winter; the Kremlin maintains that it is hitting gas infrastructure supplying the Ukrainian military.

“Putin will do everything he can to play for time,” Evelyn Farkas, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia and Eurasia in the Obama administration, told FP’s Rishi Iyengar and Keith Johnson. “He just wants another day to get another inch, and that approach has worked for him for a while, but it’s not an approach that will work indefinitely without some kind of strategic shift.”

Yet peace talks remain stalled. Russia demands ownership of its four occupied Ukrainian regions as well as assurances that Kyiv will not join NATO in the future. Ukraine, however, refuses to recognize these territorial gains and demands the right to join the alliance as an exercise in state sovereignty.


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What We’re Following

Doubling the rate. The White House announced an additional 25 percent tariff on India on Wednesday, bringing total U.S. duties against the trading partner to 50 percent. This puts India among the countries with the highest U.S. tariff rates in the world, along with Brazil, China, and Syria. The new levy will go into effect within 21 days.

According to Trump’s executive order, the additional duty is in response to New Delhi “directly or indirectly importing Russian Federation oil,” which the White House has claimed effectively finances Moscow’s war against Ukraine. Since the conflict began in February 2022, Moscow has become India’s largest oil supplier, accounting for roughly 35 percent of India’s total oil supplies in the first half of this year.

Last week, Trump also threatened to impose a “penalty” on India for its crude purchases, though it is unclear if that penalty refers to the 100 percent secondary tariffs that Trump has promised to impose on all countries that buy Russian oil.

India argues that its oil imports “are based on market factors and done with the overall objective of ensuring the energy security of 1.4 billion people of India.” New Delhi’s Ministry of External Affairs called the White House’s latest measures “unfair, unjustified and unreasonable.” And it suggested that Washington is employing a double standard by imposing tariffs on India for actions that several other countries, such as China, are also taking.

Ownership of an island. Colombian President Gustavo Petro accused Peru this week of “unilaterally” annexing an Amazon River island whose legal status is disputed. The allegation is in regard to a Peruvian law passed in June that converted Santa Rosa Island (or what Colombia calls Chineria Island) into a district within Peru’s Loreto province.

Lima maintains that it owns Santa Rosa Island based on two treaties signed in 1922 and 1929, but Bogotá claims that the island hadn’t yet emerged from the water during their signings. “There is no treaty in which Colombia has recognized Peru’s sovereignty over that island,” Petro wrote on X on Wednesday. He warned that Lima’s actions could block the Colombian city of Leticia’s access to the river and vowed that “our government will use, above all, diplomatic measures to defend our national sovereignty.”

Petro said he plans to celebrate Colombia’s independence from Spain on Thursday from Leticia; the government usually holds such celebrations in central Colombia. In response, Peru’s Foreign Ministry reiterated that its ownership of Santa Rosa Island adheres to international law.

Out of office. Bosnia’s electoral authorities stripped separatist politician Milorad Dodik of his position as the president of Republika Srpska, the country’s Serb-majority entity, on Wednesday after an appeals court sentenced him to a one-year prison term and a six-year ban on all political activity. In February, the court found Dodik guilty of defying the rulings of an international envoy overseeing the country’s 1995 peace accords.

An early election to replace Dodik must now be called within 90 days. However, Dodik has vowed to continue acting as president for as long as he has parliament’s support, adding that he will seek a temporary measure to postpone the verdict’s implementation while he appeals the ruling to Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Constitutional Court.

The European Union has stressed that the “verdict is binding and must be respected.” Dodik’s pro-Russian activities and allegations of corruption have stalled the country’s EU membership bid and prompted the United States to impose sanctions on him. However, Dodik maintains some international support, with backing from populist Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.


Odds and Ends

A president on the roof. Sounds crazy, no? But here, in FP’s little corner of D.C., that is exactly what passersby witnessed when Trump took it upon himself on Tuesday to inspect renovations to the White House. Trump has proposed a $200 million ballroom, saying, “It’s just another way to spend my money for the country.” Despite stopping roughly above the press briefing room, the president did not answer any follow-up questions from reporters as to why his daytime stroll led him to the roof.

Great Job Alexandra Sharp & the Team @ World Brief – Foreign Policy Source link for sharing this story.

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