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Secretary of state Marco Rubio has insisted the US will impose fresh sanctions on Russia if there is no progress on a peace deal with Ukraine, and denied that Washington was tempering its military support for Kyiv.
Rubio was speaking in the Senate a day after President Donald Trump held a two-hour phone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin that failed to yield a breakthrough in resolving the war in Ukraine.
Democratic politicians have accused Trump of letting down Ukraine by failing to exert pressure on Putin to end the war, for example by threatening further sanctions if he did not agree a ceasefire, as demanded by the US’s European allies.
Testifying before the Senate foreign relations committee on Tuesday, Rubio was asked if he would support a bill being pushed by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham that would impose draconian new sanctions on Russia.
The bill, which is designed to make it harder for Russia to finance its war, would impose a 500 per cent tariff on imports from countries that buy its oil and gas, among other provisions.
“If in fact it is clear that the Russians are not interested in a peace deal and they want to keep fighting a war, it may very well come to that point,” Rubio said.
But he added that Trump believed “right now if we start threatening sanctions, the Russians will stop talking. There’s value in us being able to talk to them and drive them to get to the table.”
Democratic committee members accused Trump of failing to use the call with Putin to exert any pressure on Moscow. Senator Jeanne Shaheen said the Russian leader had not agreed to any “meaningful negotiation that would end this war in Ukraine”.
“As President Trump has admitted, Vladimir Putin is taking him for a ride,” she told Rubio.
Senator Chris Van Hollen added: “You’ve teamed up with President Trump to throw the Ukrainian people under the bus, and have been played like a fiddle by Vladimir Putin.”
Rubio denied that Trump was soft on Putin and insisted that Washington had the “same leverage today [over Russia] that we had under the previous administration”.
“When Vladimir Putin woke up this morning, he had the same set of sanctions on him that he’s always had since the beginning of this conflict,” he said, adding that American arms were still flowing to Ukraine.
“Putin . . . hasn’t got a single concession, he hasn’t got a single sanction lifted.”
But he insisted the war would only end with a negotiated settlement, and it was important that the US did everything it could to bring both sides to the negotiating table. “What the president’s trying to do is end a war.”
His comments will do little to reassure allies who expressed dismay at the outcome of the Trump-Putin call, including the absence of any commitment by Russia to an immediate ceasefire.
Instead, Putin called for both sides to draft a “memorandum” on the terms of a future peace treaty, which critics said was just a delaying tactic that would allow Russia to continue fighting as talks dragged on.
European and Ukrainian leaders were also concerned at Trump’s suggestion after the discussion that the US wanted to bow out of its role as mediator, suggesting the Vatican could take over instead.
