Putin 'plays much better chess' than Trump after Russian leader declines US proposed ceasefire
Russia has agreed to stop attacking Ukrainian energy facilities but didn't endorse a full 30-day ceasefire that Donald Trump hoped would be the first step towards a more permanent peace.
Ukraine said it would support the agreement, which would see both Kyiv and Moscow stop attacking each other's energy infrastructure for around a month.
Experts have said Mr Putin may be avoiding making significant concessions to play for time as Russian troops continue to advance in eastern Ukraine.
Since Russia's full-scale 2022 invasion, Ukraine has tried to fight back against its much larger neighbour with drone and missile strikes deep in Russian territory, including on energy facilities.
Those attacks, which Moscow says amount to terrorism, have allowed Kyiv to keep pressure on Russia's economy.
That means a ceasefire on attacking energy infrastructure could benefit Russia, said Maria Snegovaya, senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Former UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said, in a post on X: "Putin plays much better chess than Trump.
"Each extra condition Putin has demanded in exchange for a ceasefire needs to be benchmarked against what it means for Ukraine's ability to defend itself," he said.
"I remember Trump's rotten Taliban deal and the Secret Annex that gave them everything they needed to win.
"Asking Ukraine to stop deep strikes, and receiving foreign military aid and intelligence only favours Russia.
"I hope the UK will NOT become a party to another rotten Trump deal.
"The UK has its own data and intelligence to share if it wants to. The US doesn't hold all the cards."
Following the news Russia would not back a full ceasefire, the White House said talks on a maritime ceasefire in the Black Sea and talks around a more permanent peace would begin.
Mr Trump and President Putin had talks earlier this week, with the US president telling Fox News they went well.
"We had a great call. It lasted almost two hours," Trump said on Fox News's The Ingraham Angle show.
Mr Putin ordered the Russian military to stop attacks against energy sites after speaking with Mr Trump, the Kremlin said, with the US leader also telling Fox News aid to Ukraine did not come up in the conversation.
"Up until recently, we really didn't have consensus around these two aspects – the energy and infrastructure ceasefire and the Black Sea moratorium on firing – and today we got to that place," Steve Witkoff, envoy to President Trump, told Fox News.
"And I think it's a relatively short distance to a full ceasefire from there.
Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky, stating he would support the 30-day ceasefire, said Russia had launched more than 40 drone strikes, including in the capital and Kyiv’s surrounding areas.
"Today, Putin de facto rejected the proposal for a complete ceasefire. It would be right for the world to reject, in response, any attempts by Putin to drag out the war," Mr Zelensky said in a post on the Telegram messaging app.
President Trump, however, did not get what he wanted.
Ukraine, which Mr Trump has described as harder to work with than Russia, agreed to the deal while Moscow did not.
"This call brought to light how difficult of an interlocutor Russia is going to be and the general unwillingness of Russia to talk about making real progress in stopping this war," said Kristine Berzina, a managing director at the German Marshall Fund think tank.
She called the limited ceasefire "a very small step forward".
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