Ukrainian thought that he had an agreement taking place to immediately suspend fights in the Black Sea. Russia said that economic sanctions should be revoked first. And the United States did not add the question of timing at all, simply by repeating the wide demand of President Trump that the murder stops.
The conflicting statements published this week after the negotiations of ceased the medium -level fire in Saudi Arabia were the last sign of a chaotic process in which, they said analysts and experts, the Kremlin seems to play for the time and obtain the upper hand.
The Trump administration has decided to guarantee a series of limited agreements of ceased the fire, claiming that the modest agreements will open the way to a wider truce and in the end a peace agreement to end the conflict. But so far, these incremental affairs have largely been a way for Russia to win concessions from Ukraine and a goodwill from a White House eager to be seen as peace.
Tuesday, Moscow said she agreed with the Black Sea truce only if the penalties on its State Agricultural Bank, Rosselkhozbank and other restrictions have been revoked. If Washington accepts those terms and pressures on the European allies to make the same, the proposed agreement of the Black Sea would be the benefit of Moscow more than Kiev, the experts said.
The Negotiations of the Black Sea followed another limited agreement mediated by Washington: a 30 -day detention in the strikes of Russia and Ukraine against energy objectives. This agreement also benefits Moscow, given that the large damage from Ukrainians have inflicted oil and gas installations throughout Russia, and has not arrived without a clear application mechanism. Both parties quickly accused each other that they continued these strikes.
And at the beginning of this month, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia actually rejected a proposal for a ceased for the 30 -day fire mediated by Washington and Kiev. Putin has established conditions, including a freezing on the recruitment of Ukrainian staff, military training and imports of weapons, which would have made Kiev particularly vulnerable were fighting to resume.
“It seems clear that the Russians are blocking and are very good in this,” said Daniel Fried, a former American diplomat and partner of the Atlantic Council of Washington, who in the past has negotiated with the Russians. “The Russians are extracting it and load it with conditions to send us along a rabbit den of complexity.”
Tuesday Trump recognized Russian tactics without criticism. Think that Moscow wants to see the end of the war, he said: “But it could be that they are dragging his feet”.
He therefore remembered adopting the same approach alone in commercial negotiations in the past, when he did not want to sign a contract but wanted “a kind of stay in the game”.
For Russia, remaining in the interviews meant lifting a series of requests, however unlikely that some of them are satisfied. Russia has framed the proposed agreement of the Black Sea as a way to revive an agreement supported since 2022 which has given it a certain control over commercial expedition through the sea.
This agreement allowed Ukraine to export her wheat through an agreed shipping corridor, but also allowed Russia to inspect all commercial ships to ensure that they did not transport weapons. Experts say that Russia has exploited this provision to block marine Ukrainian exports.
After the agreement collapsed in 2023, Ukraine successfully pushed the Russian Navy outside the Western Black Sea to ensure its shipping corridor. The operation had so much success that the exports of maritime wheat returned to pre-relational levels, above the levels reached during the agreement supported by UNF.
In the background, Kiev has no interest in welcoming Moscow requests, experts say. Mr. Fried observed that in order for an agreement of the Black Sea to be seen as balanced, it should include a clear advantage for Kiev, as a commitment from the Russians to stop attacks on the southern port of Odesa or all the export structures of Ukrainian agriculture.
On Tuesday the White House did not express explicitly to this commitment in its declarations, which referred only to the elimination of “the use of strength” in the Black Sea.
The conditions established by the Cremlin on Tuesday introduced the possibility that the United States will raise sanctions as a prerequisite for the Russian action. Mr. Fried said he had not seen a substantial concession from the Russian part that deserves such a step.
“The Russians managed to put it on the agenda, which means that they injected penalties raised as part of the initial negotiation process,” said Fried. “Why is it in our interest to do it? What is the mutual move that we will get from the Russians?”
Trump has threatened Russia with consequences if he does not pursue peace, but his administration has so far not followed. Instead, he accepted and repeated Putin’s statements on wanting to end the conflict and talk about the possibilities of a renewed era of cooperation with Russia.
The president Volodymyr Zelensky from Ukraine declared Tuesday that Moscow’s conditions on the agreement on the Black Sea were further tests of the Kremlin in search of more concessions while they deceived the United States for its real intentions.
Putin has shown a few signs to indicate his goal of submitting Ukraine as a satellite nation under the thumb of Russia. He regularly said that Russian forces are on the foot on the battlefield and that one ceased the fire would benefit only Kiev. However, he wants to continue the rapid rapprochement of the Trump administration with Moscow, indicating joint economic projects that Russia and the United States could pursue.
The Moscow conditions established on the Black Sea Agreement have little chance of being met early. They included the request to reconnect the Russian state agriculture bank to the international payment system known as Swift. This would require the cooperation of European countries that have been cut out of the interviews.
Alexander Kolyandr, an elderly member of the Center for European Policy Analysis, said that the removal of sanctions from the bank would bring significant benefits to Moscow.
“They certainly want a large state bank outside the penalties, because when you have a Kosher bank, you can do what you want,” he said. “They can cancel transactions; they can move money between countries; they can pay for dollar imports, which is increasingly cheaper; and can receive dollars for their exports”.
Although Moscow, Washington and Kiev resolve the differences in their statements on the agreement on the Black Sea, the ceased the fire discussed would do little more than the status quo, said Andrey Sizov, director of Sovecon, a company of analysis of the agricultural market.
Sizov observed that Ukraine successfully exported wheat through the Black Sea since the end of 2023 and Russia exported both oil and wheat, even if the restrictions made the activity more expensive for Moscow. He sees the current interviews as a formalization of the existing agreement.
“It’s not a step forward,” he said. “In my opinion, it shows that progress towards a respite, towards a ceased the complete fire, is quite limited.”
Constant meheut Reports contributed by Kyiv, Ukraine.