Trump says he canceled Putin meeting because 'it didn’t feel right' to him
‘In terms of honesty, the only thing I can say is, every time I speak with Vladimir, I have good conversations, and then they don't go anywhere,' says US president
WASHINGTON
US President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he canceled an upcoming summit with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin because "it didn’t feel right" to him.
"We canceled the meeting with President Putin, it didn't feel right to me," Trump told reporters at the White House alongside NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.
"It didn’t feel like we were going to get to the place we have to get, so I canceled it. But we’ll do it in the future," he added.
Trump also expressed his frustration over the lack of progress in the negotiations on ending the war in Ukraine.
"In terms of honesty, the only thing I can say is, every time I speak with Vladimir, I have good conversations, and then they don't go anywhere. They just don't go anywhere," he said.
His remarks came right after the US announced new sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil, citing Moscow’s “lack of serious commitment” to a peace process to end the Ukraine war.
When asked why he is elevating sanctions against Russia right now, Trump said: "I just felt it was time. We’ve waited a long time."
He said these are "tremendous" sanctions.
"We hope that they won't be on for long. We hope that the war will be settled," he added.
Turning to Ukraine's request for Tomahawk cruise missiles, Trump seemed to dismiss the possibility of supplying them to Kyiv, saying the long-range weapons are "complex" for Ukrainian forces to operate without extensive US training.
"The problem with the Tomahawk, a lot of people don't know it, it'll take a minimum of six months, usually a year, to learn how to use them. They're highly complex. So the only way the Tomahawk is going to be shot is if we shoot it, and we're not going do that," he said.
Trump stressed that the Tomahawk is a "very powerful weapon, very accurate weapon, and maybe that's what makes it so complex."
"It takes a year of intense training to learn how to use it, and we know how to use it, and we're not going to be teaching other people. It will be too far out into the future," he added.
