Russian President Vladimir Putin has expressed his opinion about talks with Ukraine. He believes that Ukraine is likely to start peace talks only when it runs out of military resources. And then this truce will be used to replenish its arsenal of weapons at the expense of Western aid.
Putin said that Ukraine had not achieved the expected results of its counter-offensive. Kyiv has lost about 71,500 soldiers, state news agency TASS reported. He added that Ukraine lost 543 tanks and nearly 18,000 armored vehicles of various classes. He said at an economic forum:
“Ukraine is conducting a so-called counter-offensive. There are no results, of course. Now we won’t say – failure, not failure, no results, there are losses. Large ones. Since the beginning of this counter-offensive, there have been 71.5 thousand personnel losses.”
Putin said Western allies were pushing Ukrainians to “bite off as much as possible” of the territory. He added:
“And then, when all resources – human resources, equipment, ammunition – are close to zero, achieve a stop in hostilities, saying ‘well, we have been saying for a long time that we want negotiations’ and [they] start these negotiations in order to replenish [their] resources and restore the combat effectiveness of [their] armed force.”
The Russian president noted that many parties had asked him whether Russia was ready to stop war operation. However, he stressed that Moscow cannot stop war operation as long as it faces a Ukrainian counteroffensive. He emphasized that for Russia to partake in any peace talks, Ukraine had to cancel its ban on any talks with Russia. “And declare that they are ready for this. That’s all! And then we’ll see,” Putin said.
