Trump cites ‘significant progress’ toward Ukraine settlement as Rubio confirms 60‑day sanctions pause
Donald Trump says talks on ending the war in Ukraine are advancing and acknowledges delaying new sanctions on Russia for 60 days, while Senator Marco Rubio describes a grinding conflict with no clear winner and few easy diplomatic answers.
Donald Trump is presenting himself as a broker of an eventual end to the war in Ukraine, even as sitting lawmakers describe a conflict with no side clearly ahead and civilians and soldiers dying daily.
On 18 October, Trump said that "significant progress" was being made toward a settlement in the war between Russia and Ukraine, including in talks over prisoners. He explained that he had decided not to introduce new restrictions against Russia because he didn’t want to disrupt what he called a peace process.
Trump has also attacked Ukrainian strategy. He accused President Volodymyr Zelensky of being unwilling to end the war and criticized Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil refineries, arguing that those attacks cause serious damage to the global diesel fuel market and harm American farmers and businesses.
On the battlefield, Ukraine has reported modest gains rather than a breakthrough. In the Orikhiv direction, the situation for Ukrainian forces has "improved significantly" over the past two weeks, according to one assessment, after the arrival of large‑scale reinforcements in the form of the 7th Rapid Response Corps from the Dobropillia direction. It is considered likely that remaining Russian positions on the outer southeastern streets of Orikhiv will be cleared within the next week, and that at least half of Mala Tokmachka is under Ukrainian control.
Russia, for its part, claims to be weathering large numbers of Ukrainian drone attacks. The Russian Defense Ministry reported that Russian air defenses shot down 149 drones overnight across various regions of Russia, without providing information about the consequences.
In Washington, Senator Marco Rubio has added detail to Trump’s policy choices while offering a more somber view of the war. He confirmed that Trump suspended sanctions for 60 days because he wants to see if there is "an opportunity for the talks that are going on right now." When asked what evidence exists that Vladimir Putin is open to peace talks, Rubio replied: "What evidence? This is not a criminal case. This is about diplomacy. In diplomacy, you continue to try."
Rubio has also said that no one is winning the Ukraine war, stressing that people are dying every day and that things are being blown up and destroyed daily. He described the underlying factors that led to the war, and that still shape it, as difficult to address, but said U.S. authorities would continue to try.
These comments unfold against a backdrop of continued Russian strikes on Ukrainian cities and infrastructure and regular Ukrainian drone and artillery attacks on Russian military and economic targets. For Ukrainians, the idea of easing sanctions or holding back new ones while the fighting and destruction continue is closely watched, especially as they seek to maintain leverage in any eventual talks.
Key indicators of whether Trump’s stated "significant progress" reflects concrete movement will include verifiable steps on prisoner exchanges, any adjustments to sanctions policy once the 60‑day window ends, and signs from Moscow that its targeting or negotiating stance is shifting in response to these political signals.
Sources
- OSINT