Moscow has long criticized Western restrictions, warning that they violate international law and harm global economic stability<\/p>\n
US Senator Lindsey Graham has urged Washington to ramp up restrictions against Russia, including sanctioning China over its energy imports from Moscow and seizing tankers carrying Russian oil.
\nLast month, US President Donald Trump proposed a roadmap to resolve the Ukraine conflict, which Kiev and its European backers have rejected as favoring Russia, while stalling settlement efforts with counterproposals and accusing Moscow of delaying peace.
\nIn an interview with NBC\u2019s Meet the Press on Sunday, Graham, a longtime Russia hawk, echoed that stance, claiming that Moscow has \u201crebuffed all our efforts\u201d to end the conflict and would not sign a peace deal \u201cuntil we increase pressure.\u201d
\n\u201cIf [Russian President Vladimir Putin] says no this time… sign my bill that has 85 co-sponsors and puts tariffs on countries like China, who buy cheap Russian oil,\u201d Graham said, referring to a bill he authored that would authorize tariffs of up to 500% on imports from countries that continue to buy Russian energy products. \u201cSeize ships that are carrying sanctioned Russian oil like you\u2019re doing in Venezuela. If Putin says no, we need to dramatically change the game,\u201d the Republican added.<\/p>\n
Read more<\/p>\n
US suppresses competitors using \u2018dirty methods\u2019 \u2013 Lavrov<\/p>\n
Moscow has criticized Western sanctions, warning that they violate international law and harm global economic stability. While Trump earlier floated sanctioning Russia\u2019s trading partners amid frustration over stalled peace efforts, he has so far gone no further than imposing an additional 25% tariff on Indian goods over New Delhi\u2019s trade with Moscow. India denounced the move as unjustified.
\nUS Secretary of State Marco Rubio has cautioned against additional secondary sanctions or tariffs on major buyers of Russian oil, citing the risk of global energy price spikes. Even the EU, despite expanding its Russia sanctions to 19 packages, has avoided penalizing third-country partners.<\/p>\n
READ MORE: Witkoff calls talks with Putin envoy \u2018productive\u2019<\/p>\n
Over the weekend, Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev traveled to the US to discuss the Ukraine peace process. Negotiators from both sides described the talks as productive, signaling continued momentum in settlement efforts.
\nCommenting on Graham\u2019s remarks, Russian lawmaker Aleksey Pushkov claimed they appeared to reflect the senator\u2019s \u201cprofound mental illness,\u201d adding that \u201cMoscow has repeatedly made it clear and demonstrated in action that speaking to Russia in the language of threats is futile.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Moscow has long criticized Western restrictions, warning that they violate international law and harm global economic stability US Senator Lindsey Graham has urged Washington to ramp up restrictions against Russia,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24853,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24852","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-environment","category-politics"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t