Kremlin says talks with Ukraine continue, no deal yet
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LONDON, March 17 (Reuters) – The Kremlin said on Thursday that Russia was putting colossal energy into talks on a possible peace deal with Ukraine that could swiftly stop the Russian military operation there.
“Our delegation is putting in colossal effort and demonstrates more readiness towards them than the other side,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
“Agreeing such a document, the observance of all its parameters and their implementation could very quickly stop what is happening.”
Asked about a Financial Times report that Ukraine and Russia had made significant progress on a tentative peace plan, Peskov said: “It is not right – there are elements there that are right but on the whole it is incorrect.”
People walk near the Ukrainian flag (R) and the Russian flag (L) projected on the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem,. With the prayer text in Hebrew ‘we are waiting for you’. Russian troops entered Ukraine on 24 February prompting the country’s president to declare martial law and triggering a series of announcements by Western countries to impose severe economic sanctions on Russia. EPA-EFE/ABIR SULTAN
The Kremlin, he said, would announce progress when there was progress to report. “Address all other questions to the Financial Times though,” Peskov quipped.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said U.S. President Joe Biden’s claim that President Vladimir Putin was a war criminal was unacceptable and that the United States had no right to lecture Russia after its involvement in so many conflicts.
In another development, Russia’s foreign ministry said on Thursday that giving Ukraine air defence systems, as requested by Ukraine’s president in the U.S. Congress a day earlier, would be a destabilising factor that would not bring peace to the country.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged American lawmakers on Wednesday to do more to protect his country from Russia’s invasion, pushing for the imposition of a no-fly zone and asking for aircraft and defensive systems.
“Such deliveries … would be a destabilising factor which will definitely not bring peace to Ukraine,” foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told a news briefing.
“In the long term, they could have much more dangerous consequences,” she added.
The United States and its allies want to avoid NATO being drawn into the Ukraine conflict, but they have supplied Kyiv with military aid since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24.
Moscow calls its offensive in Ukraine a “special operation” to destroy its southern neighbour’s military capabilities and capture what it regards as dangerous nationalists.
Slovakia’s Prime Minister Eduard Heger on Sunday said NATO could discuss sending his country’s Soviet-made S-300 air defence system to Ukraine.
