Russian state media, officials and prominent bloggers are celebrating the news that U.S. President Donald Trump would negotiate with President Vladimir Putin to end the war in Ukraine without pushing for Kyiv’s key peace demands to be met.
In a discussion on state broadcaster Rossia 1, Russian political scientist Sergei Luzyanin praised what he called the “three ‘No’s’” of U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth: “‘No’ to American weapon deliveries to Ukraine, ‘No’ to Hegseth meeting with the Ukrainian delegation [at Friday’s Ramstein format meeting] and ‘No’ to the potential escalation of this war.”
Luzyanin said the main symbol of American foreign policy was Trump’s “insane, enormously long signature,” and that Trump was “sawing through the Western world.”
Host Yevgeny Popov quipped that Trump was doing Russia’s job for it.
“We wanted to saw the Western world into pieces, but he decided to saw through it himself,” Popov said.
On Thursday morning, the state-run RIA Novosti news agency published an op-ed titled “The U.S. Has Finally Done Zelensky a Real Disservice.”
The piece’s author writes that the Trump administration’s announcements were “merciless” to Zelensky and that Trump was “not at all interested in the opinions of Kyiv and Brussels.”
“Trump expects from Zelensky the same thing he demands from all his appointees: less of his own opinion and more of a speedy execution of orders. That’s his style, that’s all Trump is, and he doesn’t communicate with Russia in that style, most likely only because he’s seen that it’s not promising with Russia,” the op-ed reads.
A different RIA Novosti piece claims that European sentiment toward Ukrainian refugees has shifted dramatically and casts Ukrainian refugees as criminals who “will agree to any conditions as long as they do not return to their homeland.”
A third headline on the site reads “Zelensky Told Grim News After Talks Between Putin and Trump.” It quotes right-wing American social media influencer Jackson Hinkle, saying that Zelensky would be “informed of, BUT NOT INCLUDED IN, the U.S.-RUSSIA peace deal negotiations’.”
Another state-run news agency, TASS, released a roundup of news coverage from around the world with the title, “‘Fear and Trembling in Kyiv’: Global Media on the Telephone Conversation Between the Russian and U.S. Presidents.”
TASS also republished part of a Telegram post from Senator Konstantin Kosachev in which he criticized the Biden administration, Europe and NATO for being the “party of war.”
Kosachev characterized NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte’s willingness to start peace talks as “re-shoeing in the air” after NATO did “everything possible and impossible to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia.”
“It is known that there are no eternal allies, only eternal interests. Russia has learned to defend its interests, even when it is incredibly difficult and even when it seems impossible. Indeed, it is possible,” he continued.
The Kommersant business daily, which is not state-run, ran a roundup of international media coverage of the day’s events under the headline “Putin’s Day of Triumph.”
Media personality Ksenia Sobchak, the daughter of one of Putin’s early political allies and the president’s alleged goddaughter, wrote on her Telegram channel: “One hundred percent things will not go smoothly, that’s clear. Just like the fact that no ‘territory swap’ will happen, Putin will never back down, especially publicly… But the dialogue has been started, and I am infinitely glad about it. May it end as soon as possible.”
The English-language propaganda outlets RT and Sputnik covered Trump’s comments extensively, with posts on X reading: “‘At some point you’re going to have elections too’: Trump on Zelensky”; “’I think we’re on the way to peace with Russia and Ukraine’ — Trump. He adds that he’ll meet with Putin, ‘probably in Saudi Arabia.’ But he hasn’t ‘committed’ to going to Ukraine”; and “NO PLACE FOR ZELENSKY IN FIRST PUTIN-TRUMP MEETING – TRUMP. Trump added that he hasn’t committed to visiting Ukraine.”
