Zelensky embraces new peace talks plan

Kyiv has proposed to Moscow that they hold a new round of peace talks this week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said, hours after Russian strikes across Ukraine claimed more lives.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has reiterated his readiness to have a face-to-face sit-down with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Picture: Getty Images

Kyiv has proposed to Moscow that they hold a new round of peace talks this week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Saturday, hours after Russian strikes across Ukraine claimed more lives.

Two rounds of talks in Istanbul between Moscow and Kyiv have failed to result in any progress towards a ceasefire, instead yielding large-scale prisoner exchanges and deals to return the bodies of dead soldiers.

“Security Council Secretary (Rustem) Umerov … reported that he had proposed the next meeting with the Russian side for next week,” Mr Zelensky said in his evening address. “The momentum of the negotiations must be stepped up.”

Mr Zelensky reiterated his readiness to have a face-to-face sit-down with Russian President Vladimir Putin. “A meeting at the leadership level is needed to truly ensure peace – lasting peace,” he said.

At talks last month, Russia outlined a list of hardline demands, including calls for Ukraine to cede more territory and to reject all forms of Western military support.

Kyiv dismissed them as unacceptable and at the time questioned the point of further negotiations if Moscow was not willing to make concessions.

The Kremlin said this month it was ready to continue talks with Ukraine after US President Donald Trump gave Russia 50 days to strike a peace deal or face sanctions.

Mr Trump also pledged to supply Kyiv with new military aid, sponsored by NATO allies, as its cities suffer ever-increasing Russian aerial attacks. Russia has escalated long-range aerial attacks on Ukrainian cities as well as frontline assaults and shelling over recent months, defying Mr Trump’s warning.

On Saturday, it launched missile and drone strikes that killed three people.

Two people died after a Russian missile hit Ukraine’s central Dnipropetrovsk region, an important industrial hub, into which Russia’s forces have recently advanced. An earlier salvo of 20 drones on the Ukrainian port city of Odesa killed at least one person overnight.

Russia had to suspend trains overnight, causing extensive delays in the southern Rostov region, when it came under a Ukrainian drone attack that wounded one railway worker.

Moscow and Kyiv are menacing each other with swarms of cheap drones to overwhelm air defences, as both sides said on Saturday they had intercepted hundreds of drones, now launched in large numbers almost daily.

As part of the Istanbul agreements, Kyiv received 1000 soldiers’ bodies on Thursday, while Russia said it had received 19 from Ukraine. The European Union on Friday agreed an 18th package of sanctions on Moscow that targets Russian banks and lowers a price cap on oil exports.

AFP