US House Speaker Johnson backs Senate bill to toughen sanctions on Russia
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators said in late May that they are ready to vote on a bill on sanctions against Russia if peace talks on the Russia-Ukraine war do not progress soon.
The bill, introduced to the Senate in early April, would impose new penalties on Russia and slap 500% tariffs on imports from countries that buy Russian oil, petroleum products, natural gas, or uranium.
"There's many members of Congress that want us to sanction Russia as strongly as we can," Johnson said. "And I'm an advocate of that."
U.S. President Donald Trump said he had not yet imposed new sanctions on Russia because he believed a peace deal might be within reach.
"If I think I'm close to getting a deal, I don't want to screw it up by doing that," he said, but added he is prepared to act if Moscow stalls further.
Russia and Ukraine held a second round of talks in Istanbul on June 2. Kyiv presented a peace proposal that reportedly included potential easing of sanctions on Moscow, among other clauses.
The condition proposed by Ukraine is that sanctions are automatically renewed if the ceasefire agreement is broken.
Following the new round of talks, Russia proposed a limited two- to three-day ceasefire in specific front-line areas to recover the bodies of fallen soldiers, while continuing to disregard Ukraine's call for a 30-day unconditional ceasefire supported by Western partners.
Read also: Sanctions on Russia are working, Ukraine just needs more
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