🎙President of Russia Vladimir Putin answered questions from journalist Pavel Zarubin
Pavel Zarubin: Following your meeting with Witkoff yesterday, several fairly positive statements were made. Witkoff and Trump have both expressed cautious optimism about a peaceful settlement. Zelensky has also begun making more measured and cautious statements. It is noteworthy that, in a televised interview yesterday, when asked directly whether he was prepared to acknowledge the loss of territory, he answered, “Yes, I am prepared.” What is your assessment of the situation?
💬 Vladimir Putin: First of all, my view of this matter is that this is not their territory; it is the territory of historical Russia.
Moreover, the people living in these territories voted, first, for state independence and, as a second step, for reunification with the Russian Federation. I want to emphasise that. Therefore, I believe it is inappropriate to speak of any territorial losses. <…>
❗️It has become obvious to everyone that Russia cannot be defeated on the battlefield and that inflicting a strategic defeat on it is unrealistic.
I believe that those who have sought to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia throughout the centuries, and, unfortunately, there are still people pursuing this goal today, will come to recognise the realities of modern life and understand that it is better to live in peace and harmony with Russia. This is in the interests of their peoples.
☝️ If we look at the political processes taking place in Europe, it becomes clear that the peoples of Europe do not want to fight Russia. I want our message to be heard: neither do we. We are not preparing for any war with Europe.
Some European countries, or countries in other parts of the world, want to fight Russia in order to weaken it.
But is that really Ukraine’s own national idea?
They have repeatedly said that they are prepared to fight to the last Ukrainian. But what about the Ukrainian leadership itself? How does it regard its own citizens? Does it, too, treat them as expendable material, just as those abroad who want to fight us regard them?
⚠️ That is why we have always advocated a peaceful resolution, from the very first days.
We were already saying this in 2014: let us help you reach an agreement with the south-eastern regions of what was then Ukraine. No, they deployed artillery and aircraft against civilians and effectively unleashed a war.
Then came the Minsk Agreements. (http://kremlin.ru/supplement/4804) We always sought to help them reach an understanding with that part of Ukraine that did not accept the coup d’état. No, they rejected this approach.
Then, before we launched our actions to protect the people of Donbass, we told them again: let us avoid any escalation and reach an agreement. No, they said they would fight.
👉 I want to say that we remain ready to negotiate and seek a way out of this difficult and complex situation.
The point is that these are people very close to us, you understand? There is no need to elaborate. The latest genetic research shows that Russians and Ukrainians are, in fact, one people.
I believe we can reach an agreement. We are ready to do so.
But if someone wants things to be otherwise, then so be it. In any event, we will accomplish our objectives, and all the goals of the special military operation will be achieved.
As for our talks with the representative of the United States Administration, yes, we agreed that we are ready to resume our trilateral contacts. The purpose of these talks will be to discuss how to ensure the security of both Ukraine and Russia once peace agreements have been reached – in their final form, rather than through a temporary suspension of hostilities for a short period.
We are ready to resume these contacts in order to achieve this goal.