Putin tests how far Trump will go against Europe on sanctions

The Kremlin has a deliberate strategy to test how far the US President Donald Trump is willing to go in Europe to relieve sanctions, according to people who are familiar with the situation.

Russia demands the reconnection of one of the largest state banks with the Swift International Messaging System as a condition for accepting an American closed ceasefire in the Black Sea.

The purpose of choosing the Russian agricultural bank was to see if Trump would first deal with the idea and then whether he could bring the European Union on board, two people close to the Kremlin said. The EU has jurisdiction over Swift, with head office in Belgium.

Russian President Vladimir Putin checks what it is possible to achieve with Trump and success with Swift can lead to a gradual weakening of the sanction regime as a whole, said the people who asked not to be identified about sensitive issues.

The EU ordered RSHB, as the bank is also known, and other large Russian lenders cut off from Swift in 2022 as part of radical economic sanctions in response to Putin's invasion in Ukraine. A coalition of European leaders excluded the opportunity on Thursday to relieve restrictions on Russia at a top in Paris.

The British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said they had discussed ways instead to intensify sanctions to “further pressure” on Russia to come to the negotiating table. The Finnish President Alexander Stubb said that leaders were already working on a new package of measures.

“Putin agreed with President Trump's proposal to breathe new life into the Black Zee initiative,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Friday, referring to the grain export deal 2022-2023 that broke off the agreement when Russia broke off when Russia stopped.

“As far as Swift is concerned, it is an integral part of the Black Zee initiative, with which both Europeans and the Americans have come along at the time,” said Peskov. “Now it feels like everyone has changed a role and Europeans are no longer going for it. But this is not Russia's affairs.”

After three days of negotiations in Saudi Arabia this week, the US announced on Tuesday that Ukraine and Russia had agreed to the Black Sea Weapon Stilly as the next phase in Trump's efforts to end the war, after their acceptance of a stopping of 30 days to strike on energy infrastructure.

Although Ukraine said that it would immediately stop -the fire, the Kremlin seemed to get the White House of Guard by declaring that its participation was dependent on the removal of sanctions against RSHB and other financial institutions involved in foreign trade in food and fertilizers. That included again connected to Swift, said it.

The American State Secretary Marco Rubio told reporters on Wednesday that some of the Russian conditions include sanctions that are not ours. They belong to the European Union. ” Officials would consider “what the Russian position is or what their question is in exchange” and then Trump would decide on the next step, he said.

“This is a test for Trump,” said Pavel Danilin, a political analyst who collaborates with Kremlin officials. “The Kremlin wants to see how Trump will deal with his promises.”

Russia appointed the issue to reconnect her banks with Swift during the conversations with American officials in the Saudi capital Riyadh and “the Americans took it calm,” said Grigory Karasin, one of the heads of the Russian delegation in the negotiations, against the state of television on Friday.

The current US government is “interested in dialogue with us, in finding joint approaches and solutions,” says Karasin, a former Russian deputy Foreign Minister. “Then, you will see, Europe will slowly start to return to common sense, to a kind of realism.”

This article was generated from an automated feed from the news agency without changes in text.