We will not capitulate: Ukraine

The West’s attempts to persuade Ukraine to negotiate with Moscow are ‘bizarre’, a key adviser to President Zelensky said.

Abandoned Russian forces bunkers outside Kherson airport. Picture: Getty Images

The West’s attempts to persuade Ukraine to negotiate with Moscow, after a series of major military victories by Kyiv are “bizarre” and amount to asking for its capitulation, a key adviser to the Ukrainian presidency said.

“When you have the initiative on the battlefield, it’s slightly ­bizarre to receive proposals like: ‘you will not be able to do everything by military means anyway, you need to negotiate,” said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak.

This would mean that the country “that recovers its territories, must capitulate to the country that is losing.”

US media recently reported that some senior officials were beginning to encourage Ukraine to consider talks, which Mr Zelensky has rejected without a prior withdrawal of Russian forces from all Ukrainian territory.

According to Mr Podolyak, Moscow has not made “any ­direct proposal” to Kyiv for peace talks, preferring to transmit them through intermediaries and even raising the possibility of a ceasefire.

Kyiv sees such talk as mere manoeuvring by the Kremlin to win some respite on the ground and prepare a new offensive. “Russia doesn’t want negotiations. Russia is conducting a communication campaign called ‘negotiations’,” he said.

“It will simply stall for time. In the meantime, it will train its ­mobilised forces, find additional weapons and fortify its positions.”

Despite Russia’s heavy military defeats in recent weeks, ­including Ukraine retaking the key southern city of Kherson, President Vladimir Putin still thinks “he can destroy Ukraine, this is his obsession” and negotiating with him “makes no sense”, Mr Podolyak said.

The West cannot pressurise Ukraine into negotiations, he ­insisted. “Our partners still think that it is possible to return to the pre-war era when Russia is a ­reliable partner,” he said.

Spurred on by its string of military victories, Ukraine can “afford no pause” in its counter-offensive, despite the arrival of winter cold and snow that make the situation on the ground more difficult.

AFP