In recent weeks, the administration of the US President Donald Trump has suspended the work of an interagency working group that was created to develop mechanisms to pressure Russia to accelerate peace talks with Ukraine.
Reuters reports this, citing three American officials.
The group began working in early spring 2025. However, by May it became clear that Trump was not interested in a tough line against Moscow, Reuters sources said.
During the election campaign, Trump promised to end the war in Ukraine “in one day”. However, in recent months, he has been talking more about the lack of a breakthrough in the negotiations and that the United States may cease to be a mediator in achieving peace. Against this background, the tasks of the created working group have begun to look less and less relevant, say journalistic sources.
"In the end, it all came to nothing because the president was gone. Instead of doing more, maybe he wanted to do less," one official noted.
The task force suffered its “final blow” about three weeks ago. At that time, as part of a large-scale personnel purge, most of the White House National Security Council staff were fired, including the entire team that dealt with the war in Ukraine. It is unclear who gave the order to disband it.
The groupʼs existence was previously unreported, Reuters notes. The group was organized and coordinated by senior officials from the US National Security Agency. It included representatives from the State Department, the Treasury Department, the Pentagon, and intelligence agencies.
The working group discussed, among other things, the possibility of pressuring former Soviet republics and other countries in Eastern Europe and Asia to limit the flow of goods to and energy from Russia. The groupʼs proposals ranged from economic deals to covert special operations, the sources said. They also discussed creating incentives to encourage Kazakhstan to do more to combat sanctions evasion, one of the sources told Reuters.
The termination of the task force is likely to heighten concerns among US European allies about Trump’s reluctance to fully support Ukraine. However, Trump could take a tougher stance on Russia regardless of the fate of the task force, “if he wants to be tougher on Russia”, the sources said.
- In February, the US disbanded a task force that had been fighting Russian oligarchs. Task Force KleptoCaptur was launched in 2022 to punish Putinʼs associates, as well as those who helped Russia circumvent sanctions and violate export controls.
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