Russia Reacts to Trump's Deadline Over Ukraine War

In response, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday that Moscow has “taken into account President Trump’s statement yesterday,” according to Russian state-run media.

Underscoring that Russia will continue to engage in fighting in Ukraine, Peskov said that Moscow remains “committed to the peace process to resolve the conflict around Ukraine and to ensure our interests in the course of this settlement,” according to a translation of his comments on the TASS news website.

Peskov said that Russia is interested in rebuilding ties with the United States but that “so far, the normalization process is proceeding sluggishly; we would like to see more momentum.”

In a post on X, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, a close ally of Putin who is the deputy chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation, said Trump was playing “a game of ultimatums” that could lead to a war involving the United States.

“Each new ultimatum is a threat and a step towards war. Not between Russia and Ukraine, but with [Trump’s] own country,” Medvedev said.

“I’m disappointed in President Putin,” Trump said, adding that he loves “the Russian people” and doesn’t want to impose new sanctions.

“We thought we had that settled numerous times, and then President Putin goes out and starts launching rockets into some city like Kyiv and kills a lot of people in a nursing home or whatever,” Trump said on Monday. “And I say that’s not the way to do it.”