Ukraine Praises Trump For Threatening Russian Sanctions, Considers Kyiv's Victory Signal

JAKARTA - Ukraine praised US President Donald Trump on Thursday for threatening to impose tariffs and sanctions on Russia if the country refused to make an agreement to end the war in Ukraine. Ukraine said Trump's statement sent a "strong signal".

"We welcome strong messages from President Trump and we are confident he will be the winner. And we are confident that we have additional opportunities to gain new dynamics in diplomatic efforts to end this war," Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said in a discussion panel at Davos, Switzerland. , reported by Reuters, Thursday, January 23.

Kyiv has long urged its allies to impose tougher sanctions on Russia to increase the cost of war for Moscow and prevent the country from carrying out further aggression.

Earlier referring to Russia and the war, Trump said: "If we don't make a 'deal' and I have no other choice but to apply high-level taxes, tariffs and sanctions to anything Russia sells to the United States, and various other countries to participate."

Trump said he would provide enormous assistance to Russia and Putin by making them end what he called this ridiculous war.

When asked about Trump's statement, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Trump had frequently imposed sanctions on Russia during his first term as president.

"We don't see anything new here," Peskov told reporters.

"He likes these methods, at least he likes them during his first presidency," added Peskov.

Moscow is closely monitoring all of Trump's statements, Peskov said.

"We carefully note all the differences. We remain ready for dialogue, President Putin has repeatedly discussed this - for equal dialogue, for mutual respect dialogue."