Moscow isn't buying Trump's sudden concern for Ukraine

A Kremlin spokesperson dismissed Donald Trump’s claim he cancelled a G20 meeting with Vladimir Putin over the situation in Ukraine, saying the real reason was the Mueller probe, Reuters reported Friday.

The president announced via his Twitter Thursday that he was pulling out of a planned face-to-face with Putin on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Argentina, because Russia had not returned sailors and ships seized in a maritime confrontation off the coast of Crimea on Sunday.

Trump had earlier told reporters he was still open to meeting with Putin, but shortly after his personal former fixer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to lying about a Trump Organization bid to build a tower in Moscow, he abruptly cancelled the meeting. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov claimed on Friday that Putin would still have a brief impromptu meeting with Trump at the summit.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Friday that she didn’t buy Trump’s excuse — and that the president’s “domestic political situation” was to blame.

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“Was Ukraine’s provocation in the Kerch Strait the true reason for the cancellation? We have heard the official explanation and taken note of it,” she said, sticking to the Kremlin line that Ukraine was the aggressor in Sunday’s clash.

“But is it true? I think the true reason is rooted in the domestic political situation in the United States, which is crucial for decision-making.”

Cohen’s bombshell guilty plea has ramped up the political pressure on Trump and his associates over their repeated denials of business ties in Russia, specifically a proposal to build a Trump Tower in Moscow.

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Peskov, whose staff have been linked to discussions with Trump’s team over the tower, said Friday that Russia regretted Trump’s call to cancel the meeting, and that Putin would still have a brief impromptu meeting with Trump on the sidelines of the summit, as he would with other leaders in attendance.

The comments came as tensions continue to ramp up between Russia and Ukraine over the confrontation in the Kerch Strait, which has led Kiev to temporarily impose martial law in border regions, citing fears that Moscow is planning military action.

The head of Ukraine’s border service announced Friday that it had banned all Russian men aged 16 to 60 from entering the country.

“Today, the entry of foreigners is limited — primarily citizens of the Russian Federation — non-admission of citizens of the Russian Federation aged from 16 to 60, male,” said Petro Tsygykal.

Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, and has since backed pro-Kremlin separatists fighting in the east of the country in a conflict that has taken more than 10,000 lives.

Cover image: Donald Trump, speaks during a bilateral meeting with Mauricio Macri, Argentina's president, at the G-20 Leaders' Summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on Friday, Nov. 30, 2018. This weekend's G-20 summit in Buenos Aires matters less for the main proceedings than for President Trump's expected encounter with Chinese President Xi Jinping. (Erica Canepa/Bloomberg via Getty Images)