The Trump administration reversed course on Tuesday in an announcement that the US would resume sharing real-time intelligence with Ukraine while also unpausing shipments of military aid.
In a joint statement with a delegation from Ukraine’s government, US officials indicated that the shift in focus would be aimed at pressuring Russia to come to the table and agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine within 30 days.
“Ukraine expressed readiness to accept the US proposal to enact an immediate, interim 30-day ceasefire, which can be extended by mutual agreement of the parties, and which is subject to acceptance and concurrent implementation by the Russian Federation. The United States will communicate to Russia that Russian reciprocity is the key to achieving peace,” read a joint statement released by the two countries’ delegations.
“The United States will immediately lift the pause on intelligence sharing and resume security assistance to Ukraine,” it continued.
The statement also noted the “gratitude” of the Ukrainian government and its people for continued US assistance.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio led the talks with his Ukrainian counterparts in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, after departing Washington a day earlier. He confirmed that the offer would now be presented to Russia’s government.
"Today, we've made an offer that the Ukrainians have accepted, which is to enter into a ceasefire and into immediate negotiations to end this conflict in a way that's enduring and sustainable,” said the secretary.
President Donald Trump urged Russia’s head of state, Vladimir Putin, to come to the negotiating table in remarks to reporters shortly after the joint announcement from the US and Ukrainian delegations. In recent days, the US president has expressed confidence (and admonished reporters) in the face of questions regarding whether he had specific guarantees of Russia’s willingness to negotiate in good faith — but it remains unclear if he plans to leverage any new pressure on Moscow to make that happen.
"Hopefully President Putin will agree to that also and we can get this show on the road,” Trump said on Tuesday.
Trump paused real-time intelligence sharing to Ukraine and halted all planned aid shipments one week ago after a clash in the Oval Office with Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president. The confrontation was cheered by his fans but widely mocked and treated with disgust around Europe, as major US allies including the UK and France took the blowup as the latest sign of a significant shift in US-Europe relations.
On Monday, Trump hinted that the talks surrounding a US-brokered ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine were making “great progress”, but it’s uncertain how significantly ties between Washington and Kyiv have mended. The status of a rare earth minerals deal which has been on ice since the disastrous Oval Office meeting remains unclear. And on Sunday, the US president once again derided his Ukrainian counterpart as “ungrateful” in a televised Fox News interview.
Referring to Zelensky and the military support provided to Ukraine under the Biden administration, the US president said: “It was like taking candy from a baby what [Zelensky] did.
“He’s a smart guy and he’s a tough guy and he took money out of this country under Biden like candy from a baby.”
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