Yermak: Trump’s secondary sanctions could end the war

Ukrainian Presidential Chief of Staff Andriy Yermak believes former U.S. President Donald Trump could end the Russian-Ukrainian war if he follows through on his threat to impose secondary sanctions on purchases of Russian oil and gas. Yermak made the remarks in an interview with The Times.

According to Yermak, the threat of secondary sanctions would be effective because it would pressure the two largest importers of Russian fossil fuels — China and India.

"Only economic problems are able to really press Putin and make him recognise that it is too expensive to him to continue this war," Yermak said.

"These new sanctions from the United States are so important because unfortunately all this year the price of oil has given him the opportunity to finance his military machine. They will create very strong pressure on Putin and he will lose a huge amount of money. And the countries who buy Russian oil will also press him," Yermak said.

The results will be felt by the end of the year, he suggested.

The head of the OP expressed optimism that Trump would not back down from his ultimatum.

"He knows Putin doesn’t want to stop this war now. And he knows how successful peace through strength was with Iran. That’s how he stopped the war with Iran," Yermak said.

He admitted that Ukrainians are tired after three and a half years of war, but added: Russia is far from breaking the spirit of Ukraine.

"We can compare what happened with the Nazis bombing London. Did it break the faith and the braveness of the British people? No. Did it break the braveness of your leadership of Churchill and others? No. We have no other land, we do not have another country. We are fighting for our families, for our children," Yermak said.

• On July 14, Trump said he would give Putin 50 days to reach a peace deal — otherwise, he would impose secondary tariffs on countries that continue buying energy from the aggressor state.