Russian and Ukrainian negotiating teams will again meet in Istanbul, Turkey, on Wednesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed, for the first such meeting since President Donald Trump set a 50-day deadline for a ceasefire to be reached.

Russia and Ukraine are expected to hold another round of negotiations on Wednesday in Istanbul, but the two warring countries have flatly rejected each other’s demands.

Ukraine said it would send a high-level negotiating team to Turkey peace talks with Russia, even as Moscow wrote off the talks before they had started.

U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on Fox News on Tuesday that sanctioning Russian oil to end the Ukraine war is a "very real possibility."

The Kremlin is sticking to its war demands, even as President Trump makes new threats of sanctions that would go into effect if Russian President Vladimir Putin does not agree to a ceasefire with Ukraine in less than 50 days.

Russia has responded to President Trump’s new hardline Ukraine strategy with a mix of defiance and veiled threats. -The Foreign Ministry has slammed the 50-day ultimatum as “unacceptable blackmail,” while former president Dmitry Medvedev has taken a more belligerent tone,