President Vladimir Putin is open to peace in Ukraine and is working intensively with the US, but the conflict is so complex that the rapid progress Washington wants is difficult to achieve, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday, the 30th of April, reports Reuters.
US President Donald Trump, who wants to be seen as a peacemaker, has often said he wants to stop the “bloodshed” of war in Ukraine.
But Washington has signalled that it is frustrated by the failure of Moscow and Kyiv to reach a deal to end the deadliest war in Europe since the Second World War.
“The President remains open to political and diplomatic methods to resolve this conflict,” he said.
He noted that Putin has expressed his readiness to start direct talks with Ukraine, but that Kyiv has not yet given an answer.
“Unfortunately, we have not heard any statements from Kyiv in this regard. So we do not know whether Kyiv is ready or not,” Peskov told reporters in English.
HE ADDED THAT RUSSIA’S OBJECTIVES MUST BE ACHIEVED IN ONE WAY OR ANOTHER AND POINTED OUT THAT MOSCOW PREFERRED TO ACHIEVE THESE OBJECTIVES PEACEFULLY.
“We understand that Washington wants to make quick progress in this process,” Peskov said in English. But TASS quoted Peskov as saying that the root causes of Ukraine’s war were too complex to be resolved overnight.
BNN already reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday announced a three-day ceasefire from the 8th to the 10th of May, to mark the 80th anniversary of the victory of the Soviet Union and its allies in World War II. The next day, the Kremlin rejected Ukraine’s call for a ceasefire lasting at least 30 days and starting immediately.
Trump said on Tuesday that he believed Putin wanted to stop the war in Ukraine, adding that “if it wasn’t for me, I think he [Putin] would want to take the whole country [Ukraine]”.
Trump refused to answer a question on whether the US would cut off military aid to Ukraine if Washington walked away from the conflict settlement talks.
BNN already reported that US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Tuesday that “now” is the right time for both sides to present concrete proposals to end the war and warned that the US would abandon its role as mediator if no progress is made.
Meanwhile, Russian drones attacked Ukraine’s Kharkiv and Dnipro late on Tuesday evening, killing at least one person and injuring around 50 others, officials said.