Russia Does Not Refuse to Hold Talks with Ukraine: Putin

• 04.27.2022, 00:39
•  Europe,  EEU,  World

© РИА Новости / Михаил Климентьев

Moscow does not refuse to hold talks with Kiev and it hopes it will be possible to achieve agreements on the diplomatic track, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting with visiting UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in Moscow on Tuesday, TASS reports

"Although the military operation is in progress, we still hope that we will be able to achieve agreements on the diplomatic track. We are holding negotiations. We do not reject them," Putin said.

According to him, negotiators of Moscow and Kiev "managed to achieve a major breakthrough" at talks in Istanbul. At that point, Kiev’s negotiators did not link "Ukraine’s international security demands <…> with such a notion as Ukraine’s internationally recognized borders, setting aside Crimea, Sevastopol and the recognized by Russia republics of Donbass, with certain reservations". "But unfortunately, after these agreements were achieved and after, in my view, our clearly demonstrated intentions to create favorable conditions to continue talks we faced a provocation in the city of Bucha, and the Russian army has no relation to this," Putin said.