It’s not the full 30-day ceasefire in Ukraine that US President Donald Trump demanded – far from it. But it is a deal with both Russia and Ukraine and, therefore, a rare sign of progress.
The White House announced Tuesday that both Ukraine and Russia have agreed to a limited deal restricting military action in the Black Sea – albeit with several conditions.
The key part of the agreement seeks to ensure safe passage for commercial shipping and to stop military strikes in the Black Sea. Russia and Ukraine would essentially get back unfettered access to ports crucial for their exports of grain and other agricultural produce.
Ukraine, which has waged a devastatingly successful drone campaign against the Russian Black Sea Fleet, has made clear that any return movement of Russian naval vessels would be seen by them as a violation.
A second part of the agreement includes the US and Russia developing measures to halt strikes on Russian and Ukrainian energy facilities for a period of 30 days – yet more progress, albeit partial.
But with the Kremlin there is always a rub.
After the agreement was announced, the Kremlin revealed it would only implement it after a series of sanctions had been lifted on its financial institutions involved in agricultural trade.
This would be sanctions relief via the back door.
Among other things, this is likely to include a restoration of Russia’s access, at least in part, to the US-controlled SWIFT international payments system, from which Russia has been excluded since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The Trump administration has already made breathtaking concessions to the Kremlin, taking Ukrainian NATO membership off the table and forcing Kyiv to accept territorial losses, in what remains a yet unsuccessful bid to forge peace in Ukraine.
Lifting sanctions designed to punish Moscow – which are currently causing real economic pain there – without even a short-term ceasefire commitment from the Kremlin in return, risks looking like yet another capitulation to Putin. It’s certainly one of the main things Putin wants.
Trump, who insists he remains determined to end the bloodshed in Ukraine, has found himself confronted with the complex reality of even pausing this brutal war, exploited by Putin’s tough and seasoned negotiators.
It’s worth remembering how Trump repeatedly boasted he could end the conflict in just 24 hours, later revising that to a more realistic, but still wildly ambitious, timeframe.
Now, the bar for success seems to be a short pause in the killing and, as the latest agreement has starkly underlined, even that remains elusive.
The crucial question, though, is whether this creeping ceasefire is the start of a real peace process that may develop into an actual cessation of hostilities and even a lasting peace in Ukraine.
Or will it turn out to be yet another false dawn, an agreement that leads nowhere or even, as many Ukrainians fear, toward a gradual surrender to Moscow.