The President's Daily Brief
PDB Afternoon Bulletin | March 19th, 2025: Trump's Limited Russia-Ukraine Ceasefire Already Risks Collapse & China Looks To Thwart US Panama Canal Deal
19 Mar 2025
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Full Episode
It's Wednesday, the 19th of March. Welcome to the PDB Afternoon Bulletin. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. All right, let's get briefed. First, President Trump's much-discussed and anticipated 30-day partial ceasefire agreement between Russia and Ukraine, which was supposed to halt strikes on energy infrastructure, is already collapsing.
We'll look at what happened just hours after the call between Trump and Russian President Putin. Later in the show, China is looking to scuttle the sale of two critical ports in the Panama Canal to the U.S. asset firm BlackRock, jeopardizing President Trump's plans to regain control of the strategic waterway from the Chinese Communist Party. But first, today's afternoon spotlight.
It appears that the Trump administration's hopes for a limited ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine are already at risk of collapsing, as Moscow and Kyiv accuse each other of launching air attacks on civilian targets and energy infrastructure.
Less than 24 hours after Trump's lengthy phone call with Putin, where the Russian strongman reportedly agreed to cease attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure for 30 days, Ukrainian President Zelensky said that Russia launched a massive drone and missile attack, striking civilian buildings and energy sites.
The overnight bombardment involved roughly 145 Russian drones, four cruise missiles, and two ballistic missiles, which struck two hospitals in Sumy in northeastern Ukraine, as well as a power substation in the eastern Donetsk region. That's according to a report from the Wall Street Journal.
Zelenskyy condemned what he described as a deliberate provocation and said Ukraine will be forced to respond in kind. He also held the strikes up as clear evidence that Putin is not acting in good faith when it comes to Trump's diplomatic outreach and is using the discussions to manipulate the situation to his advantage.
On Wednesday, Zelenskyy stated, quote, You see, this ceasefire is already not working. Putin's words are very much at odds with reality, end quote. The Ukrainian leader added that, quote, there won't be a situation where Russia will continue to shell our energy infrastructure and that we won't respond. We will respond, end quote.
Russia, meanwhile, said that Ukraine already launched its own overnight attack on Russian oil infrastructure in the country's south. and accused leaders in Kyiv of trying to undermine the tentative deal struck between Trump and Putin. The Russian Defense Ministry said multiple Ukrainian drones had entered their airspace and that a drone attack caused a fire at a major oil depot.
The dueling accusations underscore the fragile nature of Trump's negotiations with both Russia and Ukraine and lingering uncertainties over how to implement and enforce any potential ceasefire proposals. Zelensky said that the U.S. must closely monitor Russia's military activity and hold them accountable to their stated promises.
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