'Not our war' — US may drop Russia-Ukraine ceasefire efforts unless progress is made, Rubio says

Editor's note: The article was expanded with comments by Alexandra Filippenko, a political scientist and expert on U.S.-Russia relations.

The U.S. will cease its attempts to negotiate a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia in the following days if there is no signal that an agreement is reachable, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on April 18.

Speaking after meeting European and Ukrainian officials in Paris, Rubio said that U.S. President Donald Trump is interested in reaching a deal but has other priorities as well.

Trump began his presidency by pledging to broker a ceasefire within 24 hours, eventually extending this deadline to 100 days.

These efforts have largely stalled, as Russia continues to reject a full 30-day ceasefire backed by Washington and Kyiv, and a partial truce on strikes against energy facilities has failed to hold.

"We're not going to continue with this endeavour for weeks and months on end. So we need to determine very quickly now, and I'm talking about a matter of days, whether or not this is doable in the next few weeks," Rubio said.

"If it is, we're in. If it's not, then we have other priorities to focus on as well."

The White House has grown increasingly frustrated with the delayed peace process, as Trump has chastised both Ukraine and Russia for failing to reach a deal.

The U.S. president has also repeatedly laid the blame for the war on President Volodymyr Zelensky and former U.S. President Joe Biden, calling Russia's invasion "Biden's war."

Rubio echoed this sentiment in Paris, saying, "I think it’s important to remind everybody that the Ukraine war is a terrible thing, but it's not our war.  We didn't start it."

Speaking to journalists, Rubio also said that the U.S. "spent three years, billions of dollars supporting the Ukrainian side... but now we’ve reached the point where we have other things we have to focus on."

Alexandra Filippenko, a political scientist and expert on U.S.-Russia relations, believes Rubio's statement is aimed at Russia, as well as at Trump.

"It seems to me that this is such a very subtle, very complicated game that Rubio is playing with Donald Trump," Filippenko told the Kyiv Independent.

"He's saying to Donald Trump that actually we have a lot of other things to do... Let's push."

The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week that Rubio and Special Envoy for Ukraine Keith Kellogg have been urging Trump to adopt a tougher stance toward Moscow. So far, Trump has been leaning toward the position of Special Envoy for the Middle East Steve Witkoff, who calls for rapprochement with Russia, the outlet wrote.

Kyiv supported an unconditional ceasefire during talks with the U.S. in Jeddah on March 11 but also stressed that a comprehensive peace deal must include security guarantees—a commitment that Trump has been reluctant to make.

Moscow rejected the ceasefire proposal unless it included conditions undermining Ukraine's defense capabilities, including a full halt on military aid. The Kremlin also called for a ban on Ukraine joining NATO and full control over the partially occupied Ukrainian oblasts of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia as part of a peace deal.

Ukraine has said it would never recognize the Russian occupation of its sovereign territory.

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