Toni Waterman: US Correspondent on Trump's latest ultimatum for Russia

Russia has yet to respond to the latest ultimatum from US President Donald Trump.  

Trump says Vladimir Putin has between 10 and 12 days to make progress on ending the war with Ukraine to avoid sanctions.  

That's shrunk from the 50 days he gave the Russian leader two weeks ago.  

US correspondent Toni Waterman says there's been no official response from the Kremlin.  

She told Ryan Bridge former Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has warned sanctioning Russia would be disastrous.  

Waterman says the leader has claimed it would start war between the US and Russia.  

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
A new deadline for Russia. Trump's giving Pottin a deadline
of ten or twelve days to make a deal with
over Ukraine.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
I'm going to make a new deadline of about ten,
ten or twelve days from today. There's no reason in waiting.
There's no reason in waiting. It's fifty days. I want
to be generous, but we just don't see any progress
being made.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
So he did give fifty days. You'll remember otherwise he
said very severe terrorists will be coming to Russia and
Russia's trading partners, which would of course include China. So
what happens here? Tony Waterman, us correspondent, Feature story in
News Tony, good morning, welcome to the program.

Speaker 3 (00:40):
Good morning, Thanks for having me, Tony.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
What is anyone taking this seriously? I mean, when you
give a deadline of fifty days and then you come
and say, no, we've got a new deadline. It could
be teen, it could be twelve. We're not sure.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:52):
I mean the President has been for months now giving
a two week deadline to the Kremlins. So when the
fifty day deadline was announced earlier this month, everybody said,
that is an extremely long runway for Russia and everybody
kind of shrugged it off. So whether or not we
see anything in the next ten to twelve days is

(01:13):
really up to Putin. At this point, we haven't heard
anything any sort of response from the Kremlin to this
latest move by Trump. But Dimitri Mendettev, who is the
former Russian president, set on social media that Trump's playing
the ultimatum game with Russia, but that Trump should remember
Russia is an Israel, that it's not Iran, and that

(01:35):
each new ultimatum is a threat and a step towards war,
not between Russia and Ukraine, but a war with his
own country. So he's implying, of course, that these types
of games could lead to a war between the United
States and Russia. But the President earlier today repeated what
has now become sort of his common refrain, saying that
he's disappointed in Putin for not ending this war. He

(01:58):
feels as if he's been strung along, that the Russian
president has signaled that he would take these peace negotiations seriously,
and then is bombing the Smithereens out of you know,
Ukraine the following day. So ten to twelve days, he
left the door open for more negotiations. Saying that a
deal could be reached. But you're right with the secondary
tariffs that he's threatening if this deadline is not met,

(02:21):
one hundred percent tariffs on any country that buys Russian energy.
That is going to impact not just China but also Russia,
who are huge consumers of Russian oil.

Speaker 1 (02:30):
Yeah. It's just fascinating, isn't it, Because on the same
day you've got him saying I'll move the deadline for
China on tariffs and extend that this is the more
substantive trade talk. She've also got him saying I'll reduce
the deadline on Russia and that could potentially bring an
even bigger tariffs for the lives of China.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:50):
I mean, with this trade ward that the President kicked
off in April and then paused and is now scrambling
to make all of these trade negotiations, one of the
countries that was not included almost the only that was
not included was Russia itself. It somehow dodged the trade
war bullet when he made the announcement on Liberation Day.
But you're right, they could be now facing not just

(03:12):
more sanctions, which the President talked about today didn't give
details but said he would impose more sanctions but also
a one hundred percent tariff on countries that trade with Russia.
That's on goods coming into the United States. So it's
American public again that will be paying the price for that,
but they could be at the losing end of the stick.

(03:33):
But again, for months and months and months now, Donald
Trump has given Russia two weeks to come to the
negotiating table to take this seriously and its point, Russia
just seems to be shrugging that thread off.

Speaker 1 (03:45):
Tony, you appreciate you, Tomas Morning, Tony Wooem and US
correspondent Fiature Story and News.

Speaker 3 (03:50):
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