The head of American diplomacy, when asked whether he thought Russia did not want peace, replied: – Well, we can only be guided by what we see. They said clearly that they want the rest of the Donetsk region, and of course the Ukrainians will not agree to it. So now we see that the Russians are continuing long-range strikes into Ukraine, of course to weaken their energy grid and try to demoralize the country (…), they have made some progress in the Donetsk region. They lose 7 thousand. soldiers per week (…), so this is our assessment for now. They have made a demand that Ukraine cannot agree to.
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What demands did Russia make towards Ukraine?
Why can't Ukraine agree to Russia's demands?
What problems did Marco Rubio point out regarding sanctions against Russia?
Has Marco Rubio spoken to Sergei Lavrov recently?
Rubio also announced that the Americans are in talks with Ukrainians about what type of support they need in connection with attacks on their energy infrastructure. – And of course helping them survive the winter is important from a humanitarian point of view. The challenge is that the Ukrainian power grid is weakened every year (…) – Rubio emphasized in a conversation with journalists in Canada, where he participated in a meeting with his counterparts from the G7 group.
Marco Rubio on sanctions against Russia. “There's a lot left on our side”
— I know there are technical talks going on about the specific weapons they need. But at the end of the day, if that equipment gets damaged a week after it's installed, that's going to be a problem. And it has been like this for two or three years, he added.
When asked about sanctions against Russia, he replied: – There are not many sanctions left on our side. We hit their major oil companies, which is what everyone asked for. Of course (sanctions) have to be implemented and it will take some time before they start to be felt. But I don't know what else can be done. We are running out of things to impose sanctions on, said the head of US diplomacy.
Relations between Rubio and Lavrov. The Secretary of State revealed the details
Mark Rubio revealed that he had not spoken to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov “for a month,” but assured that their relations were “fine.”
Referring to his last conversation with Lavrov, he noted: “we would like this war to end, but we cannot simply continue meetings for the sake of meetings.” According to the media, after a conversation with the head of Russian diplomacy Rubio advised Donald Trump against meeting Vladimir Putin in Budapest. Sources of the Wall Street Journal reported that the head of US diplomacy believes that a meeting between Trump and Putin in the near future would not bring peace in Ukraine any closer.
Rubio was also asked about cases of Russians violating the borders of Eastern European countries. — We don't support them. We don't like them. But we are strongly committed to NATO and our partners if they are ever attacked. We think that (…) these provocations come from Russia. “We think they're counterproductive and obviously create a high level of tension that could lead to something bigger that would be bad news for them and bad news for everyone,” Rubio responded.
