Stunned silence from Moscow after Trump attacks Russia

There was a stony silence in Moscow for a day after US President Donald Trump criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin and imposed sanctions on two of Russia’s biggest oil companies.

Days after a “very productive” phone call between the two leaders – in which they agreed to meet in Hungary and then The US president appears to be siding with Russia over a possible peace deal with Ukraine – Trump reversed his stance on Wednesday, expressing his frustration with Moscow.

“We canceled the meeting with President Putin. It just didn’t feel right to meet. We didn’t feel like we were going to get where we wanted to go. So I canceled it, but we will do it in the future,” Trump said Wednesday.

“Every time I talk to Vladimir I have a good conversation and then they go nowhere. They don’t go anywhere,” added Trump, referring to NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, with whom he discussed peace proposals for Ukraine.

Asked why he chose to impose a package of sanctions on oil giants Lukoil and Rosneft at that point, Trump said, “I thought it was time, we’ve waited a long time.”

Trump’s comments on Putin were largely absent from pro-Kremlin state media outlets such as TASS, Radio Sputnik And RIA NovostiThursday’s news coverage, with little criticism or mention of the canceled meeting.

Just a day earlier, Russian state media — essentially, the Kremlin’s mouthpiece — was excited about the planned talks between Putin and Trump in Hungary. But that was postponed by the White Housewill proceed.

The Kremlin and various senior Russian officials blamed “fake news” for undermining the Trump-Putin summit, but the White House appeared to stall the talks after reiterating its position that Russia did not support an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine.

Putin’s press secretary Dmitry Peskov has not yet publicly commented on the canceled meeting, the sanctions or the possibility of future Trump-Putin talks. CNBC has reached out to the Kremlin for comment.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday that the ministry was ready to “continue contacts” with the U.S. State Department but said its goals in Ukraine “remain unchanged” in comments translated by NBC News. The latest sanctions on Rosneft and Lukoil were counterproductive to a peaceful solution to the war, she added.

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, a well-known anti-West hawk, slammed Trump for canceling the Budapest summit, commenting on Telegram on Thursday that “America is our enemy and their vocal ‘peacekeeper’ (Trump) is now fully on the warpath against Russia.”

“Now Trump has matched a completely crazy Europe,” Medvedev posted in comments translated by Google.

Sanctions on Lukoil and Rosneft and dozens of subsidiaries are aimed at pressuring Moscow, which has funded the three-and-a-half-year-old war in Ukraine using revenues from global oil sales, to agree to a ceasefire. The US Treasury said.

The Department of Treasury The new sanctions will hurt the Kremlin’s ability to raise funds for its war against Ukraine.

Treasury Secretary Scott Besant said his department “stands ready to take further action if necessary to support President Trump’s efforts to end another war,” Besant said. “We encourage our allies to join us and comply with these restrictions.”

EU on Thursday New sanctions imposed on Russia. The package of measures approved by member states on Wednesday evening includes a ban on Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports.

Kaja Callas, the European Union’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy and vice president of the European Commission, told CNBC on Thursday that the new sanctions are “a good sign that America is putting sanctions on big Russian oil companies. It’s really depriving Russia of funding this war. This war needs to end.”