Hear
MOSCOW.- The president of Russia, Vladimir Putinspoke this Friday and criticized the international peace summit that was organized by his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodimir Zelenskyin Switzerland, and in which the Argentine president will participate, Javier Milei. Furthermore, in a conference from the Kremlin’s Foreign Ministry, Putin put two conditions for a ceasefire in the war that began in February 2022.
In the morning (Argentine time), the Russian leader promised that the attacks would stop “immediately” and spoke about the possibility of a negotiated peace if kyiv withdraws its troops from regions occupied by Kremlin troops in Ukraine and abandons its plans to join NATO.
“As soon as kyiv (…) begins the effective withdrawal of troops (from the regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia), and as soon as it notifies that it abandons its plans to join NATO, we will immediately, in This very minute, the ceasefire order and we will begin negotiations,” Putin told Foreign Ministry officials. At the moment, it seems impossible for Zelensky to accept an agreement with these conditions, since he declared that he wants to enter the military alliance and demanded that foreign troops leave all of his territory.
These statements by the president coincide with a meeting of the leaders of the G7 in Italy. Likewise, they occur while Swiss gets ready to receive dozens of world leaders (but not from Russia) this weekend, for the peace summit in ukraine, which will try to develop a roadmap for this purpose. Milei will leave from Bari – where he was invited by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni for the meeting of the seven – to Bürngenstock to participate in that event with the chancellor. Diana Mondino; her sister, the general secretary of the Presidency, Karina Milei; the economic advisor Demian Reidel; and the deputy Fernando Iglesiaswho is head of the Foreign Relations Commission of the Lower House. Today Putin considered that this meeting is a “strategy to divert attention.”
Meanwhile, the Kremlin leader said that his advance towards kyiv in the 2022 attacks was aimed at forcing Ukraine to accept peace and that there was no intention to assault the capital, when the West claims that in reality he wanted to capture that city and establish pro-Russian leaders, but was defeated by fierce resistance.
“Western countries froze part of Russia’s assets and currency reserves. And now they are thinking of a legal basis to permanently appropriate them,” Putin complained, adding: “Despite all the tricks, the theft is still theft and will not go unpunished.” This was after the G7 yesterday announced a $50 billion loan to kyiv, secured with interest on Kremlin funds held in the West since the start of Moscow’s offensive.
After more than two years of war, Russia controls almost a fifth of Ukrainian territory, and Zelenksy claims that peace can only be based on the complete withdrawal of Putin’s army and the restoration of its territorial integrity.
Agencies AP, AFP and Reuters
THE NATION
