The Duran Podcast - Trump, energy truce. Lavrov, security guarantees not agreed. Zelensky, rejects withdrawal

Episode Date: January 30, 2026

Trump, energy truce. Lavrov, security guarantees not agreed. Zelensky, rejects withdrawal

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the energy truce, which allegedly is going to last until February 1st. Trump announced the energy truce yesterday. He said that he had spoken to Putin, and he basically called in a favor from Putin and said to have an energy truce because of the weather, the cold. And Trump said that Putin agreed, and he was very complimentary of Putin. He said it was a very, very good thing, nice thing that Putin agreed to the energy truce. And we seem to be getting confirmation from Peskov and the Kremlin that there has been some energy truce on the request of U.S. President Trump. Zelensky is also saying that there is an energy truce, though he did not learn it from Trump or anything like that. It seems like he kind of learned it from the news.

That's how he learned about it. But he says that this was being discussed at the UAE talks anyway. So we have an energy truce in Kiev and other major cities until February 1st. What are your thoughts? Well, this is a very interesting story because Trump made this announcement and there'd be no word for Moscow and Moscow remained silent for hours about it. And then Peskov said, yes, there's going to be an energy truce for seven days. He spoke specifically about Kiev so that it was, the way he sort of implied is that it only covers Kiev. And he specifically denied, well, he didn't deny exactly, but he contradicted the impression Trump gave that Putin and Trump had actually.

actually spoken about it. He said that the Americans, that Trump sent a written request to Putin for this attack on energy systems in Kiev and that Putin agreed. So there are differences between the American and the Russian account and the Russians were silent, as I said for several hours. Now, this was preceded over. the previous couple of hours by reports that were coming out of Moscow that the Americans and the Ukrainians actually asked for a full energy truce at the talks in Abu Dhabi. That during the meeting in Abu Dhabi, there was a request from the Ukrainians and the Americans, not for a seven-day truce, but for a complete truce.

on attacks on energy systems. So the Russians would not attack energy systems across Ukraine. The Ukrainians, in turn, would not attack refineries and tankers and that kind of thing. And the reports in Russia said that the Russians said no, that they were not going to do that. And we had also previously the meeting between Kushner, Wittgolf and Putin in the Kremlin. And again, if you look at Ushakov's words, this is Putin's foreign policy aid, discussing that meeting, it sort of suggests that, again, the Americans ask for some kind of truce, and Putin said that there will be no truce until there is a final agreement in the conflict. So here's what I think happened. I think the Americans and the Ukrainians pushed

very, very hard for an energy truce in Abu Dhabi. Ukraine is in a very, very bad state. Trump sent a letter to Putin asking for an energy truce. And basically, he bounced the Russians into agreeing to one, but only for seven days. Seven days doesn't make any particular difference. And I suspect, it doesn't make any difference in terms of the overall situation because the damage to the energy system is so enormous. and the Russians finding themselves into this position are basically playing along with it.

That is my sense of it. In the meantime, we have had a whole raft of statements from Lavrov to the Turkish media, from Usakov to the Russian media, from the Russian. Russia's UN ambassador, Nibenzia, and they have been taking the hardest possible line. They've been saying we have not agreed to Ukraine receiving security guarantees from the United States. Our terms are the same as always. Security guarantees that have been talked about between the United States and Ukraine have we have not been consulted about. We haven't seen any documents. in which the United States agrees to provide Ukraine with security guarantees, this kind of security

guarantees, and by the way, Lavrov in particular here, is absolutely clear about this. The sort of security guarantees that have been talked about in the media between the Americans and the Ukrainians are totally unacceptable, and Ukraine must return to full non-align neutral status. the language that the Russian officials have been using over the last couple of hours is absolutely unyielding and very, very uncompromising indeed. And my sense is that the Russians, they've been all told to do this, Lavrov, Uschikov, Nebensia, after the meetings in Moscow between Putin, Kushner, Witkoff, and after the meeting, in Abu Dhabi to put beyond any doubt to basically quell this idea that the Russians are in the mood to give compromises and to make concessions. Because if you read what these people are saying,

it doesn't seem as if the Russians are making any at all. So the statement from Peskov is that the energy truce will be until February the 1st. So that means that this energy truce was agreed on four or five days ago, right? Has there been a stoppage in hitting the energy facilities over the past week? What there has been is... On both sides, by the way, on both sides here. What there has been on the Russian side is a delay in using missiles. We haven't seen these big, powerful Russian missiles be used to pound energy facilities.

but drone attacks using gerand drones, which are becoming increasingly sophisticated, by the way, they continue all the time. There hasn't been a single night over this period of time when they have not been active. And the Russians have continued to conduct these grand strikes, and some of them, from what I could see, have attack energy facilities. So that does rather suggest that whatever it, what, ever has been happening, it has been limited to Kiev. So it's very partial. On the Ukrainian side, there has indeed been a reduction in drone attacks on Russia, but that may simply

be because drone attacks against Russia are becoming more difficult. It's not entire, it's not complete. There was heavy missile and rocket attacks by the Ukrainians, Heimars missiles against the city of Belgarod, the Russian city of Belgarod, which is on the border, near the border. Belgarod for a time was out of power. So it is not total on either side. In fact, it looks very, very ragged. And whatever it was that Trump said that was agreed or not agreed, it doesn't seem to be complete. And as you rightly say, the time space is going to be very short. By the way, by the way, I mean, Trump also put up that photo himself with Putin in Anchorage in the White House.

And I wonder whether that was also, that was also signaled to Putin. Please go ahead and give me this because I'm not getting very much out at these meetings and I need something. Right. Something doesn't add up, Alexander. It's a weak energy truce, right? Yes, yes. It's ending on February the 1st. Yes. But if you go off of Zelensky's statements that he put out today,

today or yesterday evening, when we heard the statement from Trump about the energy truce, Zelensky made it out as if he had no idea about an energy truce. Yes. So how do you have an energy truce that has been going on for the better part of a week and is going to be rapid, up on Sunday. Yeah. And Zelensky is making it out like he knew nothing about it. I mean, something doesn't add up. You see where I'm going with this? Something doesn't seem,

seem right. And are you telling me that Russia agreed to an energy truce four or five days ago and they've said nothing about it? Well, I know. Yes. I mean, I, as I said, I, feels off. Well, it is very off. And I, and as I said, Trump implied that there'd been a telephone call between Putin and Trump, and there'd not been any sort of telephone call between Putin and Trump. He didn't exactly say that they'd had a call, but he did sort of suggest that they'd been talking, speaking, exactly. The Russians are very clear that there has been no telephone call between Putin and Trump. I'd be straightforward to. I think that Trump is to a great extent making this all up, and the Russians are playing along with this. I mean, this is how it looks to me.

And the Russians, I think, have been bounced. I said this before, but I think this is what has happened, that they're saying, look, it's only going to go on until Sunday. We're putting it back. As I said, in terms of the military realities, it isn't making any difference. And Zelensky, as you rightly said, doesn't seem to have known anything about as an energy truce. And in fact, he's made a very interesting comment just shortly, which is, again, complaining that the Europeans are not providing him enough money and not providing him

money on time. And he isn't therefore able, so he says, to bi-patriot missile interceptors on time, that there are delays because the money is coming in this delayed way. So not only does that contradict the idea that there's any kind of energy truce going on, but Zelensky still wants money from the EU because, as he puts it, he needs to sort out his defense system. Yeah, Zelensky also said that Ukraine is not going to leave Donetsk and they're going to fight for the ZMPP for Zappadoz nuclear power plant. So he said that those two points in whatever negotiations are happening between all three parties.

For him, Donets, Donbaz, ZNPP is going to be. is going to be rejected if they have to, any requests from the United States to withdraw from from Dombas or to give up his ampi. Is a no go for Zelensky. But I mean, I'm reading his post on X, Alexander, and this was a post that he made at the time of the recording today, Friday, he made this post about 15, 16 hours ago. Yeah. And he says, and I'm going to just read you the post, an important statement by Bipotis about the

possibility of providing security for Kiev and other Ukrainian cities during this extreme winter period. Power supplies a foundation of life. We value the efforts of our partners to help us protect lives. Thank you, President Trump. Our teams discussed this in the United Arab Emirates. We expect the agreements to be implemented. De-escalation steps contribute to real progress toward ending the war. But this is a week's truce which started days ago, and it ends on February the 1st. I come back to my original question. How does Zelensky not know about the energy truce over the past for four or five days? How did he not know about this?

Even if it was discussed at the UAE was this discussed during the talks at the UAE and agreed on at the UAE talks and he didn't know about this or what's going on here? I mean, I think you might be on to something. Maybe Trump just made this up. Mostly. What we know, what we have been told. Or maybe he floated it to Putin. Yes. And he misunderstood? There was a miscommunication? I don't know.

Well, I mean, let me, let me, what happened, as I understand it, that the talks in the UAE, what reports in Russia are saying is that the Ukrainians of the Americans asked for an energy truce, not a seven-day truce, not a seven-day truce to cover a particularly cold period, just an energy truce altogether, and the Russian said no. And that was apparently what happened. I've seen nothing to contradict that. It seems to me, as I said, that what happened is that here's a possible explanation of the contradictions, that Trump, when he got the Russian no on the energy truce,

very disappointed, very upset that there's no energy truce, there's no visible sign of progress in the negotiations at all. He then writes to Putin, or he says that he's written to Putin, asks for or says that he's got Putin to agree to a seven-day truce to cover the period of the cold weather. And the Russians, who are in the process of carrying out surveillance, They're looking at targets in Kiev. They're doing all of these sorts of things. This has also been going on, by the way, over the last couple of days, play along and say, okay, there's a seven-day truce. We backdate it to the day of Trump's original letter or request or statement.

But, you know, we're still not going ahead with an actual energy truth. Trump then feels happy with that. So he puts up Putin's picture, like himself, the picture of himself and Putin. on the wall in the White House. And he gives, he has a conversation with Wickoff and company, which we're all there seeing. You know, there's been enormous progress. More progress has been made than at any time since the negotiations began. Progress, which is invisible to anybody else. The Russians then set out all of these very tough statements saying that they've not conceded anything. And Zelensky, who is obviously being kept completely out of the loop and has no

idea what's going on. When he hears that there's an energy truce being discussed, he either thinks it's the energy truce, in other words, the complete energy truce, which the Russians have already rejected, or perhaps he's trying to use these words of Trump to revive the idea through this statement on X, this message is posted on X, trying to get this full energy truce back up and running again. So that's perhaps a reconstruction, a plausible reconstruction of what's happened. Bear in mind that Trump has a form here. I mean, he claimed some months ago that he'd had a telephone call with Narendra Modi, had a conversation with Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of India. It was Modi supposedly promised him that

India would stop buying Russian oil by the end of 2025. There was no such call. The Indians have made that absolutely clear and no such request made over the course of any call. And we're now in 20, 26, and the Indians are still buying oil from Russia. So, I mean, Trump can either make things up entirely or give impressions that more has been agreed than has actually been agreed. Yeah, more has been agreed than has actually been agreed. And he sits in front of the media and he starts talking and stuff like this comes out. Yeah, Peskov said that Russia agreed to refrain from strikes on Ukraine until February the first at Trump's request to create favorable conditions for negotiations.

Yeah, in February the first is two days away. Yes, less than two days away. All right. So, okay, what a bizarre story, to be quite honest. It highlights how out of the loop Zelensky is. And it also highlights the miscommunication between the United States and Russia, to be quite honest. Speaking on miscommunication, Rubio and Witkoff are both stating that the security guarantees have been agreed on with Ukraine, pretty much 100%. Your thoughts there to wrap up the video.

Well, this is where we come back because the Russians say we don't know anything about this. What we're hearing about these security guarantees is completely unacceptable to us. This isn't part of the negotiations. Lavrov's interview, which is with the Turkish media, is especially interesting because Lavrov says that there are still lots of these documents and things that have been floating around, which the Russians haven't been shown that, you know, talk about this document of security guarantees. the Russians haven't seen it. Other documents as well, you know, some of the plans Zelensky's

been putting forward. I'd assumed that when Witkoff and Kushner came to meet Putin in the Kremlin about a week ago, that they were bringing all these documents with them. It seems not, because the Russians still haven't seen them. And Lavrov again said, if we're talking about security guarantees for Ukraine. The formula is still the same as far as the Russians are concerned as the one that was agreed back in April 2022 and is set out in the Istanbul agreement, which was initialed but never fully signed or ratified between Russia and Ukraine. So the Russians have not agreed to these security guarantees. What the Americans are doing, And, you know, they did this last year with a ceasefire.

You remember, you remember Kellogg's, they were 100 days away from a ceasefire at one point? All sorts of a, you know, Trump saying, you know, we're almost there, it's a week away, or something like this guy. The Americans are trying to make out that this process, which is proceeding at an extremely slow face, if at all, they're trying to give the impression that it is moving much, much faster than it is. And again, just to say, and this is not just unique to Trump.

There is an American style of negotiation, which I've come up with myself, which tends to do this, which tends to give the impression that if people meet, that means that the agreement is almost ready to be signed. But it's not the way the Russians do negotiations at all. And the Russians are, by the way, getting annoyed about it. And Lavrov was very tough, but even tougher was Nibensia at the Security Council. And some of the things that Nbenziah said about the Europeans were just, I thought, on, you know, just fell short of being almost on principle. I mean, he used words about them, which I'm absolutely not going to repeat on this program.

Well, speaking of the Europeans, Rubio, when he testified to Congress the other day, to the Senate, the other day, he said that, look, security guarantees are agreed. And the U.S. is going to provide the backstop, intel and stuff like that, satellites, all of these things, to UK and French forces that will enter Ukraine when there is a deal. I mean, French and UK boots on the ground is basically what Rubio said, when there is a ceasefire deal. Has the UK and has France? I mean, they've been talking about it. Sure, Macaron has been talking about boots on the ground for two years now. So it looks like he's getting his wish. Are they ready? No, they're not ready. They're not remotely ready.

But the other thing Rubio said was he was directly asked, have the Russians agreed to this? And he had to admit, no, no, they have not. I tell you what is happening. Because, again, I've been in this sort of situation before, is that the Americans are discussing one set of things with the Europeans and the Ukrainians. They're agreeing with the Ukrainians and the Europeans one completely different set of things. So what they're talking about are the Russians.

They're telling the Russians. One thing they're telling the Ukrainians and the Europeans something completely different. Now, that is a terrible way to conduct negotiations. certainly with a party like Russia, it can cause, it most often does cause negotiations to completely break down. But this is what they're doing. They're agreeing with everybody. So the British and the French said, we want to send troops to Ukraine and we want

an American backstop. The Americans say yes. The Ukrainians say, we want a security guarantee from you. and the Americans say yes. And they don't say any of this to the Russians. They don't tell the Russians what they have agreed with the Europeans and with the Ukrainians. And at the same time, they're telling the Russians, yes, of course we agree that the Ukrainians need to withdraw from Donbass and all of those other things. So, as I said, to say that this is the wrong way to conduct negotiations is an understatement. But I'm afraid, I'm increasingly afraid, that this

is what has happened. That's the way it looks. Yeah. Meanwhile, the war grinds on. The war grinds on and will continue to do so because this type of negotiation guarantees that the war will grind on. I mean, it inevitably, unavoidably will. Yeah, all right. We will end it on that note.

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