Secretary Rubio Provides Update On 'Agreement In Principle' Between Russia And Ukraine On Black Sea

Forbes Breaking News

During a press briefing with Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness on Wednesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke about Ukraine-Russia ceasefire negotiations.

Transcript

00:00Your first question, I was so fired up about that one

00:02that I forgot the other one.

00:04Oh, yes, that one, easy ones.

00:06Well, look, I think yesterday our negotiators are en route

00:09or perhaps they've already arrived after spending,

00:12I think they met with the Ukrainians twice,

00:14the Russians once.

00:14What we have here is an agreement in principle

00:17on a Black Sea ceasefire.

00:19We got two things from that.

00:20The first is we have more detailed definition

00:23of what the energy ceasefire entails.

00:26And the second is the principle concept of a Black Sea ceasefire.

00:30Obviously, after our meeting, as part of their release,

00:33the Russians detailed a number of conditions

00:36that they want to see met in order to do that.

00:39So we're going to evaluate that.

00:41Some of those conditions include sanctions that are not ours.

00:43They belong to the European Union.

00:45So we're going to be gathering and sort

00:47of when our folks get back, sitting down,

00:50going through the proposals,

00:51getting their impressions of the conversations

00:53so we can more fully understand what the Russian position is

00:56or what their ask is in exchange.

00:58And then we'll present that to the President

00:59who will ultimately make a decision

01:00about what the next step is.

01:02I think it's a good thing that we have both the Ukrainians

01:05and the Russians talking about ceasefires, be they energy

01:08or be they potentially in the Black Sea.

01:11But obviously, this is hard and difficult work.

01:14This is a protracted three and almost three

01:16and a half year war now or three year war.

01:20It has, you know, a lot of framework of sanctions

01:26that have been built globally now that have to be looked

01:29at as part of an ultimate end to a conflict.

01:32There's a lot of things that have to be worked through.

01:34And I certainly think the only way you're going to make progress

01:37on these things is by engaging with both sides,

01:39understanding their asks, their demands,

01:43and seeing what's possible.

01:44So we're going to have a chance now to sort of sit down as a team

01:46and evaluate when they arrive in detail how the meetings went

01:50with the Ukrainians, how the meetings went with Russia,

01:53what are the Russians asking for,

01:54what do the Ukrainians ask for, compare all that,

01:56and then make a decision on that basis

01:58about what comes next in this process.

02:01In the end, the goal here is peace.

02:03The goal is to end a war where people are dying.

02:05And I think everyone should be happy

02:07that the United States is engaged in a process

02:09of ending a war and bringing about peace.

02:11It's not going to be easy.

02:12It won't be simple.

02:13It'll take some time.

02:14But at least we're on that road and we're talking

02:16about these things, and we're going to test it

02:18and see what's possible.

02:19We think we owe that to the world.

02:20And the President, I continue to say, is the only leader

02:23in the world right now, President Trump,

02:25who's in a position to even get these two nations to a city

02:29to talk about these things, albeit in rooms far apart

02:34from one another when these talks are going on.

02:35But nonetheless, they're talking.

02:36It's the first time in a while

02:37that we've seen any conversation about this.

02:39But we have a lot of work yet to be done, and we'll know more

02:41after we get the readout from our teams.

Category

Transcript

Recommended