Vladimir Putin spoke on Friday, receiving the American emissary Steve Witkoff on Friday, the ‘possibility of’ direct negotiations’ between Moscow and kyiv, against the backdrop of diplomatic negotiations about a peace plan promoted by Donald Trump.
Steve Witkoff, the privileged interlocutor of the Russian head of state within the American administration, has thus met Mr. Putin for the fourth time since the unexpected relaunch of relations between their two countries in mid-February at the initiative of the American president.
‘How are you going, Mr. President?’ Asked Mr. Witkoff, all smiles, shaking the hand of the Kremlin master, who answered him very well, thank you! ‘ In English, according to a video broadcast by the Russian presidency.
Mr. Putin’s diplomatic advisor, Iouri Ouchakov, then said that the interviews had lasted three hours and had been ‘constructive and very useful’.
‘This discussion has made it possible to bring the positions of Russia and the United States not only to Ukraine but also on several other international questions, “he told journalists.
According to him, ‘there was question in particular the possibility of resuming direct negotiations between the representatives of Russia and Ukraine’.
No direct negotiations with a view to a conflict cessation has taken place between Russians and Ukrainians since that which took place during the first months of the Russian offensive, in 2022, and which had not succeeded.
‘We come to progress,’ has commented on the Russian emissary for economic issues at international Kirill Dmitriev, one of the interlocutors of the Americans.
Crimea’s question
The United States has had separate discussions with Russians and Ukrainians for several weeks in order to find an agreement on an end of hostilities.
In this context, Donald Trump assured Tuesday in an interview with Time magazine broadcast on Friday that Russia would keep Crimea, a Ukrainian peninsula which it annexed in 2014 and whose recognition as Russian is mentioned, according to media, in the American proposal.
‘Russia will keep Crimea. And (Ukrainian President Volodymyr) Zelensky understands that, ‘said the American president in this interview. He repeats it that Ukraine is, according to him, responsible for the conflict: ‘What started war is when they (the Ukrainians, editor’s note) began to speak of joining NATO’, he said.
In recent days, the American president has repeatedly criticized his Ukrainian counterpart, which he attributes blockages in the negotiations.
Thursday, Russian diplomacy chief Sergei Lavrov said that his country was ready for an agreement for the fighting to cease, after a warning from Donald Trump to Vladimir Putin following strikes on kyiv Thursday, who killed 12.
Mr. Zelensky assured that one of the missiles used in this bombing had been produced in North Korea and also included American manufacturing components.
‘The missile that killed civilians in kyiv contained at least 116 components from other countries, most of which, unfortunately, were manufactured by American companies’, he said.
‘Vladimir, stop!’
The latest Russian deadly strikes have led Donald Trump to get out of the very conciliatory tone adopted lately towards Vladimir Putin.
‘Vladimir, stops!’ He annoyed himself on his social social platform, adding that he was not happy ‘with these attacks that occurred to a very bad timing’.
He also said that the United States exerted ‘strong pressure’ on Moscow in order to end the conflict and even judged that Russia would make a fairly large concession ‘by agreeing not to seize all of Ukraine.
kyiv and its European allies accuse Russia of prolonging negotiations to the intention by always publicly presenting maximalist requirements: control of the five Ukrainian regions of which it claims the annexation, the renunciation of Ukraine to join NATO and its demilitarization.
More broadly, Vladimir Putin would like to reach the Americans to an agreement on an overhaul of security architecture in Europe, he who denounces NATO’s expansion at Russian borders since the dislocation of the USSR in 1991.
Ukraine, for its part, wants solid military security guarantees from its Western allies to dissuade Moscow from attacking again after the conclusion of a possible ceasefire.
The subject of possible territorial concessions is very divisive in Ukraine. Russia today controls around 20% of the Ukrainian territory.
‘One of the scenarios (…) would be to abandon territories. It is unfair, but for peace, temporary peace, perhaps it is a solution, temporary ‘, has entrusted the mayor of kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, in an interview with the BBC broadcast on Friday.
Mr. Zelensky, for his part, ruled out on Thursday any recognition of Crimea as Russian. ‘We do everything our partners have proposed, except what is contrary (…) to the’ Ukrainian Constitution on the territorial integrity of the country, he explained.
/ATS
