(Moscow and Kyiv) Vladimir Putin said Friday that he will negotiate with Ukraine in the event of a withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from the four regions it claims and when Kyiv renounces joining NATO, sweeping away the peace summit organized in Switzerland and to which Moscow was not invited.
“As soon as Kyiv […] begins the effective withdrawal of troops [from the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions], and it notifies the abandonment of its plan to join NATO, we will immediately, the very minute, the order to cease fire and begin negotiations,” Mr. Putin said in front of the executives of the Russian Foreign Ministry.
These demands constitute a de facto request for surrender from Ukraine, the objective of which is to maintain its territorial integrity and sovereignty.
President Putin’s demands “clash against common sense,” said Mykhailo Podoliak, adviser to the Ukrainian presidency, on Friday.
“We must get rid of these illusions and stop taking seriously “Russia’s proposals” which clash with common sense,” he said on X.
Mr. Putin proclaimed in September 2022 the annexation of the four regions of eastern and southern Ukraine, in addition to that of Crimea in 2014.
Vladimir Putin specified that Ukraine must hand over all these territories to Russia, even though Moscow only partially occupies them.
He also denigrated the peace summit, from which Russia was excluded, planned in Switzerland for June 15 and 16 at the initiative of Ukraine, seeing it as a “stratagem to divert everyone’s attention” from the who are, according to him, the Westerners and the authorities in Kyiv.
“In this regard, I want to emphasize that without Russia’s participation and without an honest and responsible dialogue with us, it is impossible to achieve a peaceful solution in Ukraine and the security of Europe in general,” insisted the Russian president.
Ukraine and Russia attacked each other with drones and missiles overnight from Thursday to Friday, injuring several people in Ukraine and damaging a fuel storage site in a Russian border region.
Both countries have stepped up cross-border air attacks in recent months, with Kyiv targeting Russian refineries and fuel depots and Moscow targeting Ukrainian power plants and gas storage facilities.
On the Russian side, anti-aircraft defenses shot down 87 Ukrainian drones during the night, 70 of which targeted the southern region of Rostov, which notably houses the headquarters of the Russian operation in Ukraine.
According to the governor of the region Vassili Goloubev, the attack did not cause any casualties, but caused power cuts in several localities.
In the Voronezh region, bordering Ukraine, “an oil depot was slightly damaged” by falling debris from downed drones, Governor Alexander Gusev said on Telegram.
The Ukrainian Air Force announced that it had destroyed 14 Russian missiles and 17 drones overnight.
A new wave of strikes was also underway in the morning, with Kinjal missiles flying over the Kyiv region and heading towards the Khmelnytsky region further west, the same source said.
The Khmelnytsky region has a military airfield that has been repeatedly targeted by Russia.
In Solyodve, near the front line in the eastern region of Donetsk, “six people were injured” and around ten buildings damaged during a Russian bombardment, said Governor Vadym Filashkin.
Three people were also injured in a drone attack in the Sumy region (North-East) and several buildings were hit by a fire in the neighboring Kharkiv region, the target of a Russian ground offensive since May 10.
