Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has ruled out a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Russia or Belarus. He said this when speaking to journalists, commenting on another proposal to come to Moscow, this time voiced the day before by Putin’s aide Yury Ushakov.
“Of course, it is impossible for me to meet with Putin in Moscow. It is the same as meeting Putin in Kyiv. I could just as well invite him to Kyiv — let him come. I publicly invite him, if he dares, of course,” Zelenskyy said, according to RBC-Ukraine.
In Zelenskyy’s view, such “invitations” in fact demonstrate the Russian side’s unwillingness to meet.
“But if someone does not want to meet but, for some reason, cannot afford to say this directly, then these invitations to Moscow are voiced. It is clear what is happening,” he added.
Zelenskyy stressed that the Ukrainian side takes seriously the need to end the war and is ready for any real format of a high-level meeting.
“I do not know what result it would bring. But at least it would definitely be greater than what is happening today. Of course, we always advocate that Europeans should also be involved in the process. But I am not sure that the other two sides would support such a format specifically for a leaders’ meeting — not on security guarantees, for example, but precisely on particularly complex issues,” he said.
“But in Moscow and in Belarus this is simply impossible, and it is absolutely clear why — because these are states, one of which is the aggressor that started and is waging a war against us, killing us, and the other country is its partner in these actions,” Zelenskyy added.
Commenting on the talks in Abu Dhabi, Zelenskyy noted that sensitive issues were discussed there and that the United States and Ukraine also held bilateral talks. According to him, the Americans want to advance the issue of de-escalation, namely the non-use of long-range strike weapons. Zelenskyy said that Ukraine is ready for such a decision.
“In any case, we want to end the war and we are ready for de-escalatory steps. If Russia does not strike us, we will not take retaliatory steps. That is all, and we have already spoken about this principle before. This is an opportunity, not an agreement,” he said.
However, there are no specific agreements on this yet.
“There are no secrets. There has been no direct dialogue, no direct agreements on this between us and Russia. If Russia does not strike our energy sector, generating or otherwise, we will not strike their energy sector. I think this is the answer that the mediator of the talks — the United States — was expecting. We always demonstrate that we support all rational American initiatives and support any real initiatives on de-escalation and the like,” he said.
