“Putin uses Medvedev as a tool to express statements related to nuclear weapons, he doesn’t want to discredit his own good peacekeeper’s name,” Lieutenant-General Ihor Romanenko, former deputy head of the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, said ironically.

The coming week could bring an important moment in the war between Russia and Ukraine, as President Trump’s deadline for the Kremlin to reach a peace deal approaches — or it could simply melt away. Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff was expected in Moscow in the middle of this week,

President Trump is rattling the U.S.’s formidable nuclear saber amid his growing frustration with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s refusal to halt the war in Ukraine, just days ahead of Trump’s deadline for a ceasefire.