Civilian deaths in Sumy attack can force Washington with Putin | to become hard Ukraine

Even after the distorted standards of the war, the Russia was astonishingly brazen attack on Sumy on Sunday morning. According to Ukraine, which are armed with cluster ammunition, two high-speed rockets that were hit with cluster ammunition to the heart of the border town were waiting for a theater performance as families, or simply strolling around on a mild spring day.

The number of fatalities is currently 34, including two children. Pictures from the scene show body or funeral bags on the floor, a trolley bus and cars that are burned out, rubble and glass scattered. It was ruthless, cruel and malignant and its consequences for those who gave the order and urged “start”.

In order to look at a city attack in the full knowledge that the civilian population will be present, a Russian culture reflects impunity, which was allowed to endure without effective challenge. Nevertheless, Washington’s approach under Donald Trump existed in trying to negotiate an end to the war by talking directly to Moscow and at the same time remained silent about Russian attacks on the civilian population.

The talks between the United States and Russia have continued unabated in the past two months when the Russian attacks on the cities of Ukraine have apparently increased. Nine adults and nine children were killed when a Russian ballistic rocket with cluster bombs hit a children’s playground in Kryvyi Rih at the end of last week.

People were burned alive in their cars and the bodies of children were found dead on the playground, but the attack was weakened by the US Ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, who, on the line of the White House, would not say that the deadly rocket came from Russia when it tweeted: “This is the reason why the war has to end.”

Brink has now announced that she will step down and have been more open. On Sunday, the ambassador attributed the Sumy attack to Russia and repeated that cluster bombs were used. But now that she is on the way out, it is easier for her to say your opinion, while Russia’s Vladimir Putin toys with Trump and the rest of the US government have hardly developed in peace talks that have hardly developed in two months.

On Friday, the Russian leader spent four hours in talks with Steve Witkoff, a property developer from a donor who has become an important Trump consultant for Ukraine and the Middle East. What they have spoken is unclear, but reports indicate that Witkoff urged the idea that the fastest way to bring Russia in order to reconcile a ceasefire in Ukraine is to force Kyiv, the whole of four provinces, which are only partially occupied by the Russia’s military, including the cities of KHerson and Zaporizhia.

The dissonance between killing and destruction in Sumy on Sunday and the photographed handshake between Witkoff and Putin is only too obvious to most observers. It is not clear why it should even be considered that Ukraine hand over the territory (which even the USA Kyiv cannot easily force) if Russia is ready to accept daily attacks on civilian population.

But Moscow believes and pretends to believe that it can get through with it. The Kremlin will ignore the condemnation of European leaders and wait for the news cycle to develop further – and to continue to attack the Ukrainian cities in little military. Drone attacks are not only commonplace, but there are also concerns that they are routinely armed with cluster ammunition, while almost every day one or two, difficult to disturb ballistic rockets are thrown into the fatal mix.

In Kyiv, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy hopes that Trump will gradually recognize that Putin is not negotiating in good faith. The attack in the center of Sumy hardly indicates a strong appetite for peace. However, it is unclear to what point the white house, if at all, is ready to conclude that killing civilians means that it has to put real pressure on Russia to negotiate the Kremlin instead of pampering the Kremlin.