DEL RIO, Texas: The US flew Haitians camped in a Texas border town back to their homeland Sunday and tried blocking others from crossing the border from Mexico in a massive show of force that signaled the beginning of what could be one of America’s swiftest, large-scale expulsions of migrants or refugees in decades.
More than 320 migrants arrived in Port-au-Prince on three flights, and Haiti said six flights were expected Tuesday. In all, US authorities moved to expel many of the more 12,000 migrants camped around a bridge in Del Rio, Texas, after crossing from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico.
The US plans to begin seven expulsion flights daily on Wednesday, four to Port-au-Prince and three to Cap-Haitien, according to a US official who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly. Flights will continue to depart from San Antonio but authorities may add El Paso, the official said.
The only obvious parallel for such an expulsion without an opportunity to seek asylum was in 1992 when the Coast Guard intercepted Haitian refugees at sea, said Yael Schacher, senior US advocate at Refugees International whose doctoral studies focused on the history of US asylum law.
Similarly large numbers of Mexicans have been sent home during peak years of immigration but over land and not so suddenly.
Central Americans have also crossed the border in comparable numbers without being subject to mass expulsion, although Mexico has agreed to accept them from the US under pandemic-related authority in effect since March 2020. Mexico does not accept expelled Haitians or people of other nationalities outside of Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.
When the border was closed Sunday, the migrants initially found other ways to cross nearby until they were confronted by federal and state law enforcement. An Associated Press reporter saw Haitian immigrants still crossing the river into the US about 1.5 miles (2.4 kilometers) east of the previous spot, but they were eventually stopped by Border Patrol agents on horseback and Texas law enforcement officials.
As they crossed, some Haitians carried boxes on their heads filled with food. Some removed their pants before getting into the river and carried them. Others were unconcerned about getting wet.
Agents yelled at the migrants who were crossing in the waist-deep river to get out of the water. The several hundred who had successfully crossed and were sitting along the river bank on the US side were ordered to the Del Rio camp. “Go now,” agents yelled. Mexican authorities in an airboat told others trying to cross to go back into Mexico.
Migrant Charlie Jean had crossed back into Ciudad Acuña from the camps to get food for his wife and three daughters, ages 2, 5 and 12. He was waiting on the Mexican side for a restaurant to bring him an order of rice.
“We need food for every day. I can go without, but my kids can’t,” said Jean, who had been living in Chile for five years before beginning the trek north to the US It was unknown if he made it back across and to the camp.
Mexico said Sunday it would also begin deporting Haitians to their homeland. A government official said the flights would be from towns near the US border and the border with Guatemala, where the largest group remains.
Haitians have been migrating to the US in large numbers from South America for several years, many having left their Caribbean nation after a devastating 2010 earthquake. After jobs dried up from the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, many made the dangerous trek by foot, bus and car to the US border, including through the infamous Darien Gap, a Panamanian jungle.
Some of the migrants at the Del Rio camp said the recent devastating earthquake in Haiti and the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse make them afraid to return to a country that seems more unstable than when they left.
“In Haiti, there is no security,” said Fabricio Jean, a 38-year-old Haitian who arrived in Texas with his wife and two daughters. “The country is in a political crisis.”
Since Friday, 3,300 migrants have already been removed from the Del Rio camp to planes or detention centers, Border Patrol Chief Raul L. Ortiz said Sunday. He expected to have 3,000 of the approximately 12,600 remaining migrants moved within a day, and aimed for the rest to be gone within the week.
“We are working around the clock to expeditiously move migrants out of the heat, elements and from underneath this bridge to our processing facilities in order to quickly process and remove individuals from the United States consistent with our laws and our policies,” Ortiz said at news conference at the Del Rio bridge. The Texas city of about 35,000 people sits roughly 145 miles (230 kilometers) west of San Antonio.
Six flights were scheduled in Haiti on Tuesday — three in Port-au-Prince and three in the northern city of Cap-Haitien, said Jean Négot Bonheur Delva, Haiti’s migration director.
The rapid expulsions were made possible by a pandemic-related authority adopted by former President Donald Trump in March 2020 that allows for migrants to be immediately removed from the country without an opportunity to seek asylum. President Joe Biden exempted unaccompanied children from the order but let the rest stand.
Any Haitians not expelled are subject to immigration laws, which include rights to seek asylum and other forms of humanitarian protection. Families are quickly released in the US because the government cannot generally hold children.
Some people arriving on the first flight covered their heads as they walked into a large bus parked next to the plane. Dozens lined up to receive a plate of rice, beans, chicken and plantains as they wondered where they would sleep and how they would make money to support their families.
All were given $100 and tested for COVID-19, though authorities were not planning to put them into quarantine, said Marie-Lourde Jean-Charles with the Office of National Migration.
Gary Monplaisir, 26, said his parents and sister live in Port-au-Prince, but he wasn’t sure if he would stay with them because to reach their house he, his wife and their 5-year-old daughter would cross a gang-controlled area called Martissant where killings are routine.
“I’m scared,” he said. “I don’t have a plan.”
He moved to Chile in 2017, just as he was about to earn an accounting degree, to work as a tow truck driver. He later paid for his wife and daughter to join him. They tried to reach the US because he thought he could get a better-paying job and help his family in Haiti.
“We’re always looking for better opportunities,” he said.
Some migrants said they were planning to leave Haiti again as soon as possible. Valeria Ternission, 29, said she and her husband want to travel with their 4-year-old son back to Chile, where she worked as a bakery’s cashier.
“I am truly worried, especially for the child,” she said. “I can’t do anything here.”
US launches mass expulsion of Haitian migrants from Texas
https://arab.news/gpum2
US launches mass expulsion of Haitian migrants from Texas
- More 12,000 migrants, mostly Haitians, had camped around a bridge in Del Rio, Texas, after crossing from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico
Iran, US to hold second round of high-stakes nuclear talks in Rome
- Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi arrived in Rome
- Tehran and Washington have had no diplomatic relations since shortly after Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution
Rome: The United States and Iran are set to resume high-stakes talks Saturday on Tehran’s nuclear program, a week after an initial round of discussions that both sides described as “constructive.”
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi arrived in Rome, images broadcast early Saturday by Iranian state television showed, where he was set to join Oman-mediated talks with US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff.
They come one week after the two sides conducted what Iran called indirect talks in Muscat. Those were the first discussions at such a high level between the foes since US President Donald Trump abandoned a landmark nuclear accord in 2018.
Western countries including the United States have long accused Iran of seeking to acquire nuclear weapons — an allegation Tehran has consistently denied, insisting that its program is for peaceful civilian purposes.
Tehran and Washington have had no diplomatic relations since shortly after Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution.
Following his return to office in January, Trump revived his “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions against Iran.
In March he sent a letter to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urging renewed nuclear talks while warning of military action if diplomacy failed.
“I’m not in a rush” to use the military option, Trump said on Thursday. “I think Iran wants to talk.”
On Friday Araghchi said Iran “observed a degree of seriousness” on the US side during the first round but questioned their intentions.
“Although we have serious doubts about the intentions and motivations of the American side, in any case we will participate in tomorrow’s (Saturday’s) negotiations,” he said at a press conference in Moscow.
In a social media post early on Saturday, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said Tehran was “aware that it is not a smooth path but we take every step with open eyes, relying also on the past experiences.”
’Crucial stage’
In an interview published on Wednesday by French newspaper Le Monde, the United Nations nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi said Iran was “not far” from possessing a nuclear bomb.
During Trump’s first term, Washington withdrew from the 2015 accord between Tehran and world powers which offered Iran relief from international sanctions in return for curbs on its nuclear program.
Tehran complied with the agreement for a year after Trump’s withdrawal before scaling back its compliance.
Araghchi was a negotiator of the 2015 deal. His counterpart in Rome, Witkoff, is a real estate magnate Trump has also tasked with talks on Ukraine.
Iran currently enriches uranium up to 60 percent, far above the 3.67 limit in the deal but still below the 90 percent threshold required for weapons-grade material.
On Friday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio urged European countries to decide on whether to trigger the “snapback” mechanism under the 2015 agreement, which would automatically reinstate UN sanctions on Iran over its non-compliance.
The option to trigger the mechanism expires in October this year.
Iran has previously warned it could withdraw from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty if the mechanism were triggered.
Grossi, who held talks with Iranian officials during a visit to Tehran this week, said the US and Iran were “at a very crucial stage” in the talks and “don’t have much time” to secure a deal.
’Non-negotiable’
Iranian officials have insisted that the talks only focus on its nuclear program and lifting of sanctions.
Araghchi said a deal with the US was “likely” if Washington refrained from “making unreasonable and unrealistic demands,” without elaborating.
Analysts had said the United States would push to include discussions over Iran’s ballistic missile program as well as Tehran’s support for militants in the Middle East.
Araghchi said Iran’s right to enrich uranium was “non-negotiable,” after Witkoff called for its complete halt. Witkoff had previously demanded only that Iran return to the ceiling set by the 2015 deal.
On Tuesday, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said the country’s military capabilities were off limits in the discussions.
Iran’s regional influence and its missile capabilities were among its “red lines” in the talks, the official IRNA news agency reported.
On Friday US ally Israel affirmed its unwavering commitment to preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, saying it had a “clear course of action” to prevent this.
Khamenei on Tuesday said Iranians should not pin hopes on progress in the negotiations which “may or may not yield results.”
Gunman fires at Sri Lanka church ahead of Easter bombings anniversary
- The shooting damaged windows and no one was hurt and a suspect has been arrested
Colombo: A gunman fired at a church in Sri Lanka, police said Saturday, with the country on high alert six years since Easter Sunday bombings killed hundreds.
The gunman opened fire Friday at a church in Manampitiya, 160 kilometers (100 miles) northeast of the capital Colombo, a police statement said.
The shooting damaged windows and no one was hurt, while a suspect has been arrested, police said.
“Initial investigations suggest that the suspect had targeted the church due to a personal enmity with the pastor,” the statement said.
Armed police and troops have been deployed to nearly all churches nationwide during Easter celebrations, with security heightened following the 2019 attack.
Suicide bombers in 2019 killed 279 people, including 45 foreigners, at three churches and three hotels.
More than 500 people were wounded in the attack, which officials blamed on a home-grown Islamist group.
The Catholic Church will commemorate the victims on Monday, by declaring them “Heroes of the Faith.”
Sri Lanka’s Catholic minority has maintained a campaign for justice since the bombings, saying that prior investigations failed to answer outstanding questions.
The Church has accused successive governments of protecting those behind the attack and several high-level investigations have identified links between military intelligence units and the bombers.
JD Vance goes to the Vatican following remarkable papal rebuke over Trump crackdown on migrants
- Vance was due to meet Saturday with the Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin
- Vance, a Catholic convert, was spending Easter weekend in Rome with his family and attended Good Friday services in St. Peter’s Basilica
VATICAN CITY: US Vice President JD Vance is meeting with the Vatican No. 2 official, following a remarkable papal rebuke of the Trump administration’s crackdown on migrants and Vance’s theological justification of it.
Vance, a Catholic convert, was due to meet Saturday with the Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin. There was speculation he might also briefly greet Pope Francis, who has begun resuming some official duties during his recovery from pneumonia.
Vance was spending Easter weekend in Rome with his family and attended Good Friday services in St. Peter’s Basilica on Friday after meeting with Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni.
Francis and Vance have tangled sharply over migration and the Trump administration’s plans to deport migrants en masse. Francis has made caring for migrants a hallmark of his papacy and his progressive views on social justice issues have often put him at odds with members of the more conservative US Catholic Church.
Vance, who converted in 2019, identifies with a small Catholic intellectual movement, viewed by some critics as having reactionary or authoritarian leanings, that is often called “postliberal.”
Postliberals share some longstanding Catholic conservative views, such as opposition to abortion and LGBTQ+ rights. They envision a counterrevolution in which they take over government bureaucracy and institutions like universities from within, replacing entrenched “elites” with their own and acting upon their vision of the “common good.”
Just days before he was hospitalized in February, Francis blasted the Trump administration’s deportation plans, warning that they would deprive migrants of their inherent dignity. In a letter to US bishops, Francis also appeared to respond to Vance directly for having claimed that Catholic doctrine justified such policies.
Vance had defended the administration’s America-first crackdown by citing a concept from medieval Catholic theology known in Latin as “ordo amoris.” He has said the concept delineates a hierarchy of care — to family first, followed by neighbor, community, fellow citizens and lastly those elsewhere.
In his Feb. 10 letter, Francis appeared to correct Vance’s understanding of the concept.
“Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extends to other persons and groups,” he wrote. “The true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the ‘Good Samaritan,’ that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.”
Vance has acknowledged Francis’ criticism but has said he would continue to defend his views. During a Feb. 28 appearance at the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast in Washington, Vance didn’t address the issue specifically but called himself a “baby Catholic” and acknowledged there are “things about the faith that I don’t know.”
While he had criticized Francis on social media in the past, recently he has posted prayers for Francis’ recovery.
On Friday, Vance, his wife and three young children had front-row seats at the Vatican’s Good Friday service in St. Peter’s, a two-hour solemn commemoration featuring Latin and Italian readings. Francis did not attend.
But the pope has begun receiving visitors, including King Charles III, and this week ventured out of the Vatican to meet with prisoners at Rome’s central jail to keep a Holy Thursday appointment ministering to the most marginalized.
He has named other cardinals to preside over Easter services this weekend, but officials haven’t ruled out a possible brief greeting with Vance.
“I’m grateful every day for this job, but particularly today where my official duties have brought me to Rome on Good Friday,” Vance posted on X. “I wish all Christians all over the world, but particularly those back home in the US, a blessed Good Friday.”
Trump administration makes major cuts to Native American boarding school research projects
- The cuts are just a fraction of the grants canceled by the National Endowment for the Humanities in recent weeks as part of the Republican administration’s deep cost-cutting effort across the federal
- At least $1.6 million in federal funds for projects meant to capture and digitize stories of the systemic abuse of generations of Indigenous children in boarding schools
DUBAI: At least $1.6 million in federal funds for projects meant to capture and digitize stories of the systemic abuse of generations of Indigenous children in boarding schools at the hands of the US government have been slashed due to federal funding cuts under President Donald Trump’s administration.
The cuts are just a fraction of the grants canceled by the National Endowment for the Humanities in recent weeks as part of the Trump administration’s deep cost-cutting effort across the federal government. But coming on the heels of a major federal boarding school investigation by the previous administration and an apology by then-President Joe Biden, they illustrate a seismic shift.
“If we’re looking to ‘Make America Great Again,’ then I think it should start with the truth about the true American history,” said Deborah Parker, CEO of the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition.
The coalition lost more than $282,000 as a result of the cuts, halting its work to digitize more than 100,000 pages of boarding school records for its database. Parker, a citizen of the Tulalip Tribes in Washington state, said Native Americans nationwide depend on the site to find loved ones who were taken or sent to these boarding schools.
Searching that database last year, Roberta “Birdie” Sam, a member of Tlingit & Haida, was able to confirm that her grandmother had been at a boarding school in Alaska. She also discovered that around a dozen cousins, aunts and uncles had also been at a boarding school in Oregon, including one who died there. She said the knowledge has helped her with healing.
“I understand why our relationship has been the way it has been. And that’s been a great relief for myself,” she said. “I’ve spent a lot of years very disconnected from my family, wondering what happened. And now I know — some of it anyways.”
An April 2 letter to the healing coalition that was signed by Michael McDonald, acting chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, says the “grant no longer effectuates the agency’s needs and priorities.”
The Associated Press left messages by phone and email for the National Endowment for the Humanities. White House officials and the Office of Management and Budget also did not respond Friday to an email requesting comment.
Indigenous children were sent to boarding schools. For 150 years the US removed Indigenous children from their homes and sent them away to the schools, where they were stripped of their cultures, histories and religions, and beaten for speaking their native languages.
At least 973 Native American children died at government-funded boarding schools, according to an Interior Department investigation launched by former Interior Secretary Deb Haaland. Both the report and independent researchers say the actual number was much higher.
The forced assimilation policy officially ended with the enactment of the Indian Child Welfare Act in 1978. But the government never fully investigated the boarding school system until the Biden administration.
In October, Biden apologized for the government’s creation of the schools and the policies that supported them.
Haaland, a Laguna Pueblo citizen who’s running for governor in New Mexico, described the recent cuts as the latest step in the Trump administration’s “pattern of hiding the full story of our country.” But she said they can’t erase the extensive work already done.
“They cannot undo the healing communities felt as they told their stories at our events to hear from survivors and descendants,” she said in a statement. “They cannot undo the investigation that brings this dark chapter of our history to light. They cannot undo the relief Native people felt when President Biden apologized on behalf of the United States.”
Boarding school research programs are feeling the strain. Among the grants terminated earlier this month was $30,000 for a project between the Koahnic Broadcast Corporation and Alaska Native Heritage Center to record and broadcast oral histories of elders in Alaska. Koahnic received an identical letter from McDonald.
Benjamin Jacuk, the Alaska Native Heritage Center’s director of Indigenous research, said the news came around the same time they lost about $100,000 through a Institute of Museum and Library Services grant for curating a boarding school exhibit.
“This is a story that for all of us, we weren’t able to really hear because it was so painful or for multitudes of reasons,” said Jacuk, a citizen of Kenaitze Indian Tribe. “And so it’s really important right now to be able to record these stories that our elders at this point are really opening up to being able to tell.”
Former Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs Bryan Newland described the cuts as frustrating, especially given the size of the grants.
“It’s not even a drop in the ocean when it comes to the federal budget,” said Newland, a citizen of the Bay Mills Indian Community (Ojibwe). “And so it’s hard to argue that this is something that’s really promoting government efficiency or saving taxpayer funds.”
In April 2024, the National Endowment for the Humanities announced that it was awarding $411,000 to more than a dozen tribal nations and organizations working to illustrate the impact of these boarding schools. More than half of those awards have since been terminated. The grant cuts were documented by the non-profit organization National Humanities Alliance.
John Campbell, a member of Tlingit and the Tulalip Tribes, said the coalition’s database helped him better understand his parents, who were both boarding school survivors and “passed on that tradition of being traumatized.”
When he was growing up, his mother used to put soap in his mouth when he said a bad word. He said he learned through the site that she experienced that punishment beginning when she was 6-years-old in a boarding school in Washington state when she would speak her language. “She didn’t talk about it that much,” he said. “She didn’t want to talk about it either. It was too traumatic.”
How Trump backed away from promising to end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours
- He has changed his tone since becoming president again.
- Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Friday suggested the U.S. might soon back away from negotiations altogether without more progress.
DUBAI: During his campaign, Donald Trump said repeatedly that he would be able to end the war between Russia and Ukraine “in 24 hours” upon taking office. He has changed his tone since becoming president again.
As various US emissaries have held talks looking for an end to the war, both Trump and his top officials have become more reserved about the prospects of a peace deal. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Friday suggested the US might soon back away from negotiations altogether without more progress, adding a comment that sounded like a repudiation of the president’s old comments.
“No one’s saying this can be done in 12 hours,” he told reporters.
The promises made by presidential candidates are often felled by the realities of governing. But Trump’s shift is noteworthy given his prior term as president and his long histories with both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The White House on Friday did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment on Trump’s evolving deadline comments.
Here’s a look at Trump’s evolution on the way he talks about the Russia-Ukraine war:
‘A very easy negotiation’
MARCH 2023: “There’s a very easy negotiation to take place. But I don’t want to tell you what it is because then I can’t use that negotiation; it’ll never work,” Trump told Fox News Channel host Sean Hannity, claiming that he could “solve” the war “in 24 hours” if he were back in the White House.
“But it’s a very easy negotiation to take place. I will have it solved within one day, a peace between them,” Trump said of the war, which at that point had been ongoing for more than a year since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
MAY 2023: “They’re dying, Russians and Ukrainians. I want them to stop dying. And I’ll have that done — I’ll have that done in 24 hours,” Trump said during a town hall on CNN.
JULY 2024: When asked to respond to Trump’s one-day claim, Russia’s United Nations Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia told reporters that “the Ukrainian crisis cannot be solved in one day.” Afterward, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said that “a top priority in his second term will be to quickly negotiate an end to the Russia-Ukraine war.”
AUGUST 2024: “Before I even arrive at the Oval Office, shortly after I win the presidency, I will have the horrible war between Russia and Ukraine settled,” Trump told a National Guard Conference. “I’ll get it settled very fast. I don’t want you guys going over there. I don’t want you going over there.”
After Trump wins in November
DEC. 16, 2024: “I’m going to try,” Trump said during a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago club, asked if he thought he could still make a deal with Putin and Zelensky to end the war.
JAN. 8, 2025: In a Fox News Channel interview, retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg — now serving as Trump’s special envoy to Ukraine and Russia — proposed a 100-day deadline to end the war. Friday marked 100 days since that interview. The 100th day of Trump’s presidency is April 30.
Trump becomes president and starts negotiations
JAN. 31: Trump says his new administration has already had “very serious” discussions with Russia and says he and Putin could soon take “significant” action toward ending the grinding conflict.
“We will be speaking, and I think will perhaps do something that’ll be significant,” Trump said in an exchange with reporters in the Oval Office. “We want to end that war. That war would have not started if I was president.”
FEB. 12: Trump and Putin speak for more than an hour and Trump speaks afterward with Zelensky. Trump says afterward, “I think we’re on the way to getting peace.”
FEB. 19: Trump posts on his Truth Social site that Zelensky is serving as a “dictator without elections.” He adds that “we are successfully negotiating an end to the War with Russia, something all admit only ‘TRUMP,’ and the Trump Administration, can do.”
FEB. 28: Trump and Zelensky have a contentious Oval Office meeting. Trump berates Zelensky for being “disrespectful,” then abruptly calls off the signing of a minerals deal that Trump said would have moved Ukraine closer to ending the war.
Declaring himself “in the middle” and not on the side of either Ukraine or Russia in the conflict, Trump went on to deride Zelensky’s “hatred” for Putin as a roadblock to peace.
“You see the hatred he’s got for Putin,” Trump said. “That’s very tough for me to make a deal with that kind of hate.”
The Ukrainian leader was asked to leave the White House by top Trump advisers shortly after Trump shouted at him. Trump later told reporters that he wanted an “immediate ceasefire” between Russia and Ukraine but expressed doubt that Zelensky was ready to make peace.
MARCH 3: Trump temporarily pauses military aid to Ukraine to pressure Zelensky to seek peace.
Trump claims his 24-hour promise was ‘sarcastic’
MARCH 14: Trump says he was “being a little bit sarcastic” when he repeatedly claimed as a candidate that he would have the Russia-Ukraine war solved within 24 hours.
“Well, I was being a little bit sarcastic when I said that,” Trump says in a clip released from an interview for the “Full Measure” television program. “What I really mean is I’d like to get it settled and, I’ll, I think, I think I’ll be successful.”
MARCH 18-19: Trump speaks with both Zelensky and Putin on successive days.
In a March 18 call, Putin told Trump that he would agree not to target Ukraine’s energy infrastructure but refused to back a full 30-day ceasefire that Trump had proposed. Afterward, Trump on social media heralded that move, which he said came “with an understanding that we will be working quickly to have a Complete Ceasefire and, ultimately, an END to this very horrible War between Russia and Ukraine.”
In their own call a day later, Trump suggested that Zelensky should consider giving the US ownership of Ukraine’s power plants to ensure their long-term security. Trump told Zelensky that the UScould be “very helpful in running those plants with its electricity and utility expertise,” according to a White House statement from Secretary of State Marco Rubio and national security adviser Mike Waltz.
APRIL 14: Trump says “everybody” is to blame: Zelensky, Putin and Biden.
“That’s a war that should have never been allowed to start and Biden could have stopped it and Zelensky could have stopped it and Putin should have never started it,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.
Talk of moving on
APRIL 18: Rubio says that the US may “move on” from trying to secure a Russia-Ukraine peace deal if there is no progress in the coming days.
He spoke in Paris after landmark talks among US, Ukrainian and European officials produced outlines for steps toward peace and appeared to make some long-awaited progress. A new meeting is expected next week in London, and Rubio suggested it could be decisive in determining whether the Trump administration continues its involvement.
“We are now reaching a point where we need to decide whether this is even possible or not,” Rubio told reporters. “Because if it’s not, then I think we’re just going to move on. It’s not our war. We have other priorities to focus on.”
He said the US administration wants to decide “in a matter of days.”
Later that day, Trump told reporters at the White House that he agreed with Rubio that a Ukraine peace deal must be done “quickly.”
“I have no specific number of days but quickly. We want to get it done,” he said.
Saying “Marco is right” that the dynamic of the negotiations must change, Trump stopped short of saying he’s ready to walk away from peace negotiations.
“Well, I don’t want to say that,” Trump said. “But we want to see it end.”
