(Moscow) The head of Russian diplomacy judged that a meeting between Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky would be “counter-productive” for the time being and conditioned it on the adoption of Moscow’s demands in the negotiations .
Posted at 6:59
Vladimir Putin “said he would never refuse a meeting with President Zelensky, but this meeting must be well prepared […] The conflict within Ukraine has escalated all these years, a lot of problems have accumulated,” Sergei Lavrov said.
“So to meet and say, ‘What do you think? I think that…” would just be counterproductive”, he continued, during a press conference, while the Russian and Ukrainian delegations are expected in Istanbul on Monday for a new session of discussions.
The Russian diplomat reaffirmed the demands made by the Kremlin at the start of the offensive against Kyiv on February 24: the protection of the populations of Donbass, as well as the “demilitarization” and “denazification” of Ukraine.
“The denazification and demilitarization of Ukraine is a mandatory part of the deal we are trying to achieve,” he said. “We will only need a meeting (Putin/Zelensky, editor’s note) once we have visibility on the settlement of these key issues. »
“We are obliged to ensure that Ukraine ceases to be the object of military experimentation by the West and NATO and poses a military and physical threat to Russia,” he said. he added.