Russia rides the Iran war windfall while its Ukraine endgame stalls

The 90-day window opened with American envoys shuttling between Davos, Moscow, and Geneva to try to end the Ukraine war. Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner met Vladimir Putin in late January, and the first US-Russia-Ukraine trilateral session convened in Geneva in mid-February. Those talks produced no breakthrough. Russia kept demanding recognition of its territorial gains and a neutral Ukraine, while Kyiv refused. On April 11, an Orthodox Easter truce collapsed within hours, with both sides logging thousands of alleged violations. A second Trump-brokered ceasefire, announced on May 8 for the May 9 to 11 Victory Day window, held only loosely.

The defining event of the window came on February 28, when the United States and Israel launched strikes on Iran that killed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Putin called the assassination a "cynical murder" but stopped short of meaningful military aid to Tehran. Russia leaned on its UN Security Council seat and on coordinated statements with China and the Gulf, while Iran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz drove Urals crude above $90 a barrel and handed Moscow an estimated $40 billion oil windfall. India responded by nearly doubling its Russian crude imports in March, to roughly 2.06 million barrels a day, and publicly rejected US pressure to wind those purchases down.

Moscow tightened its Asian flank further. On April 26, Defense Minister Andrey Belousov met Kim Jong Un in Pyongyang and agreed a "long-term" five-year military cooperation plan for 2027 through 2031, formalizing a relationship that has already moved North Korean troops and missiles into the Ukraine fight. Xi Jinping and Putin met virtually in early February to reaffirm strategic coordination, and in April Russia floated a BRICS joint food reserve to blunt Middle East supply shocks.

In Europe, the picture split. Germany hardened against any direct dialogue with Putin, while France sent a delegation to Moscow in February carrying letters from Emmanuel Macron, and Italy's Giorgia Meloni endorsed reopening talks. The European Union adopted its 20th sanctions package on April 23, hitting maritime services, twenty more banks, and crypto rails. Hungary and Slovakia dragged the process out for weeks. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico then flew to Moscow on May 9 to stand with Putin at the Victory Day commemorations, leaving him almost alone inside the EU after Viktor Orban's electoral defeat in Hungary cost the Kremlin its closest Brussels ally.

Russia's periphery moved against it. Vice President JD Vance visited Yerevan on February 10, Armenia confirmed a purchase of American V-BAT drones, and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan signaled an EU membership referendum. In late April, an al-Qaeda-aligned offensive joined Tuareg rebels in overrunning bases across northern Mali, and Russia's Africa Corps was forced out of the strategic town of Kidal, the most public failure yet for Moscow's Sahel security model.