President Donald Trump threw a curveball into the Russia-Ukraine war earlier this week, announcing that the U.S. will provide offensive weapons, including Patriot missile batteries, to Ukraine through NATO allies. Additionally, Trump has threatened secondary tariffs on Russia’s trading partners if Russia does not agree to a ceasefire within 50 days.
In the background, the European Union has been pushing for months for new sanctions on Russia, although it has encountered some resistance from some of its members.
According to DW.com, which cited material from AFP, Reuters, and the Associated Press, the European Union’s foreign ministers have been meeting in Brussels to discuss another round of sanctions on Russia, which would be the 18th since the start of the war in 2022.
The View From Latvia on Russia Sanctions…
Latvian Deputy Foreign Minister Artjoms Ursulskis, per DW, is “confident any remaining issues blocking the approval of an 18th round of sanctions on Russia will be dealt with.” Ursulskis said that there is confidence that the EU will “iron out” the remaining “small details on economic impacts.”
Slovakia has recently resisted the idea of new sanctions, especially those targeting Russian energy.
Ursulskis also suggested sanctions on Russia’s “shadow fleet,” which DW describes as “opaquely owned and often non-insured ships” that Russia uses to sell oil.
“It’s not just about sanctioning ships, but companies helping to circumvent sanctions,” the Latvian minister said, referring to efforts that “bring in a lot of money for the Russian economy.”
“If we shrink Russia’s economy, it will be less able to finance war,” he added.
And from Lithuania
Meanwhile, per DW, the foreign minister from another former Soviet Baltic Republic has weighed in on Trump’s about-face on weapons and his tariff threat.
“There is still a dance for two with the U.S.,” Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kestutis Budrys said of Trump’s shift. Budrys went on to state that it’s time for the EU to “sync with the Americans and their timeline,” as well as a “signal for Europe to prepare itself.”
“Putin has to react when sanctions packages come along,” Budrys added, calling the sanctions something that “Putin listens to.”
Nearing Agreement?
Reuters reported over the weekend that the EU envoys were close to an agreement on the Russian oil cap question, although “one member state still has a technical reservation on the new cap.” Other reports stated that Slovakia and Malta were the EU member states that were objecting.
However, Politico reported that Slovakia was “eying a deal” on the sanctions, intending to agree on Tuesday.
“We need to win something in this fight, though it will not be a 100-0 result,” Politico quoted President Prime Minister Robert Fico as stating, citing a Reuters report. “We want political commitments, guarantees from partners and the Commission that this problem will not remain only on Slovakia’s back.”
“We want to resolve this by Tuesday because tensions are rising on all sides,” Fico added.
One potential deal, as reported by Reuters, would include “a dynamic price mechanism for the price cap.”
“The initial price would be around $47 a barrel based on the average price of Russian crude for the last 22 weeks minus 15%. Further, the price would be revised based on the average oil price every six months instead of the proposed three months,” Reuters said of the proposed deal.
“Slovakia – which has held up the proposed package – is still seeking reassurances from the European Commission on its concerns about plans to phase out Russian gas supply but it has agreed to the new measures, the sources said.”
About the Author: Stephen Silver
Stephen Silver is an award-winning journalist, essayist, and film critic, and contributor to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Broad Street Review, and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. For over a decade, Stephen has authored thousands of articles that focus on politics, national security, technology, and the economy. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) at @StephenSilver, and subscribe to his Substack newsletter.
Military Concepts
A 7th Generation Fighter Is Coming
Swamplaw Yankee
July 16, 2025 at 5:15 am
Can the world MSM imagine if 300,000 or more Jewish children were mass abducted out of their families? What would the MSM look like?
Or, would the MSM not really react? Just like the like warm concern form the MSM about the torture, sex abuse, rape and killing of Jewish women on October 7.
The op-ed refers to a “curve ball”? Monday was a day of mourning. The MAGA POTUS Trump displayed his new second term inability to be a leader of the WEST.
Trump showed the world his incapacity to confront and solve the cultural genocide of Ukrainians that the POTUS Obama Democrat Cabal greenlighted in 2014. The re-conquest of Ukraine by Putin was also the re-start of the 900 year old sex trade tradition of the ethnic russian peasant. Putin’s “Little green groomers” immediately started trading with russian traitors in Crimea of tanks/ammo for shipments of “Lolita” children.
Putin received another MAGA POTUS Trump free, no-cost personal gift for his vast army of child molesters and pedophiles. On behalf of all citizens, Trump gifted the ruskie mass abductors 50 more free days of sexual abuse, torture and cultural genocide.
There was zero Curveball for another 50 days. How many Ukrainian fathers would be killed and maimed in this time period?
Notably, the world noticed zero objection from any segment of the USA population about the Monday POTUS inaction. No feminist in America of any sort objected to the continual sex enslavement of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian girls as part of russian womens mass abduction organizations. Web sites galore with names and photographs of women sex trade facilitators go purposely ignored by US feminists. The “Lolita” reality is so ok, accepted, normal by the USA “Epstein generation”.
The first, prime and moral concern is that the MAGA POTUS still clings to a delusion of his role as a world negotiator for the WEST. Trump is incapable of that leadership role which he abdicated months back. Now, Trump can repose in self-selected lethargy for 50 days.
In 50 days Trump could have demanded, received and concluded from Putin pre-payment of $10,000,000 US gold bullion for each and every Ukrainian victim as
compensation and reparation for up to eleven years of sexual abuse and torture.
Putin’s orc ruskie butchers can maim and kill as many Ukrainian fathers for 50 days as he wishes with POTUS Trumps greenlighting this inhumanity.
Can the reader imagine the reaction if the world reacted that way to the October 7th muslim incursion? -30-
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