President Donald Trump’s trusted foreign envoy Steve Witkoff is due in Moscow on Wednesday after the Kremlin requested a meeting with him in a last-ditch effort to avoid the punishing new sanctions Trump has threatened to impose this week,

Previous Trump promises, threats and cajoling have failed to yield results., and the stubborn diplomatic stalemate will be hard to clear away. Meanwhile, Ukraine is losing more territory on the front line, although there is no sign of a looming collapse of its defenses.