MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday proposed direct talks with Ukraine aimed at ending the war, an initiative welcomed by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy who said Kyiv was willing to talk but Moscow must agree to a ceasefire.
Putin sent thousands of troops into Ukraine in February 2022, unleashing a war that has killed hundreds of thousands of soldiers and triggered the gravest confrontation between Russia and the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
With Russian forces grinding forward, the Kremlin chief has offered few, if any, concessions so far but has proposed talks with Ukraine in the Turkish city of Istanbul that he said would be held without preconditions and aimed at a durable peace.
“We are proposing that Kyiv resume direct negotiations without any preconditions,” Putin said in a televised statement from the Kremlin that began after 1:30 a.m. on Sunday (2230 GMT Saturday). “We offer the Kyiv authorities to resume negotiations already on Thursday, in Istanbul.”
Zelenskiy said in a statement on social media website X it was “a positive sign that the Russians have finally begun to consider ending the war” but “the very first step in truly ending any war is a ceasefire.”
“We expect Russia to confirm a ceasefire – full, lasting, and reliable – starting tomorrow, May 12th, and Ukraine is ready to meet,” he said.
U.S. President Donald Trump, who says he wants to be remembered as a peacemaker and has repeatedly promised to end the war, said a great day was dawning for Russia and Ukraine if the “bloodbath” of the war could be ended.
“A potentially great day for Russia and Ukraine!” Trump said on Truth Social. “Think of the hundreds of thousands of lives that will be saved as this never ending ‘bloodbath’ hopefully comes to an end.”
Putin’s proposal for direct talks with Ukraine came hours after major European powers demanded on Saturday in Kyiv that Putin agree to an unconditional 30-day ceasefire or face “massive” new sanctions.
Putin dismissed what he said was the attempt by some European powers to lay down “ultimatums”.
Putin said that he does not rule out that during his proposed talks in Turkey both sides will agree on “some new truces, a new ceasefire,” but one that would be the first step towards a “sustainable” peace.
NO CEASEFIRE?
French President Emmanuel Macron said that Putin’s proposal for direct peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv showed that the Russian leader is looking for a way forward but he’s also trying to buy time.
“It’s a first step but it’s not enough,” Macron told reporters on his way back from Ukraine early on Sunday. “An unconditional ceasefire is not preceded by negotiations.”
Russia, Putin said, had proposed several ceasefires, including a moratorium on striking energy facilities, an Easter ceasefire and most recently the 72-hour truce during the celebrations marking 80 years since victory in World War Two.
Putin said that during the May ceasefire Ukraine had attacked Russia with 524 aerial drones, 45 sea drones, a number of Western missiles and Russia had repelled five attacks on Russian regions. Ukraine accused Russia of violating the temporary truces, including the May 8-10 ceasefire.
Despite Putin’s call for peace talks, Russia on Sunday launched a drone attack on Kyiv and other parts of Ukraine, injuring one person in the region surrounding the Ukrainian capital and damaging several private homes, Ukrainian officials said.
Putin said that talks should address the root causes of the war and he would speak to Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan later on Sunday about facilitating the talks, which he said could lead to a ceasefire.
“Our proposal, as they say, is on the table. The decision is now up to the Ukrainian authorities and their curators, who are guided, it seems, by their personal political ambitions, and not by the interests of their peoples.”
PEACE?
Putin, whose forces control one-fifth of Ukraine and are advancing, has stood firm in his conditions for ending the war despite public and private pressure from Trump and repeated warnings from European powers.
In June 2024, he said that Ukraine must officially drop its NATO ambitions and withdraw its troops from the entirety of the territory of four Ukrainian regions claimed by Russia.
Russian officials have also proposed that the U.S. recognize Russia’s control over parts of Ukraine and demanded that Ukraine remains neutral though Moscow has said it is not opposed to Kyiv’s ambitions to join the European Union.
Putin specifically mentioned the 2022 draft deal which Russia and Ukraine negotiated shortly after the Russian invasion started.
Under that draft, a copy of which Reuters has reviewed, Ukraine should agree to permanent neutrality in return for international security guarantees from the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council: Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.
“It was not Russia that broke off negotiations in 2022. It was Kyiv,” Putin said. “Russia is ready to negotiate without any preconditions.”
He thanked China, Brazil, African and Middle Eastern countries and the United States for their efforts to mediate.
Former U.S. President Joe Biden, Western European leaders and Ukraine cast the invasion as an imperial-style land grab and repeatedly vowed to defeat Russian forces.
Putin casts the war as a watershed moment in Moscow’s relations with the West, which he says humiliated Russia after the Soviet Union fell in 1991 by enlarging NATO and encroaching on what he considers Moscow’s sphere of influence, including Ukraine.
(Reporting by Marina Bobrova, Dmitry Antonov, Lidia Kelly, Anastasia Lyrchikova and Felix Light; editing by Guy Faulconbridge, Lincoln Feast and Christian Schmollinger)
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