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Zelenskiy says he is ‘ready to talk to Putin’
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has reiterated an offer to hold direct talks with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, in the Ukrainian president’s fullest public comments on the prospect of peace talks in weeks.
Russia’s withdrawal from Ukraine should be a starting point for any discussions between the two leaders, Zelenskiy told Italy’s RAI 1 television, Reuters reports.
Zelenskiy said:
As president, I am ready to talk to Putin, but only to him. Without any of his intermediaries. And in the framework of dialogue, not ultimatums.
Ukraine and Russia have not held face-to-face talks since 29 March. Interfax news agency has quoted Moscow’s chief negotiator, Vladimir Medinsky, as saying peace talks were being held remotely.
Zelenskiy also ruled out suggestions that Ukraine should make concessions for the sake of securing a peace agreement that would allow Putin to save face, adding that Ukraine would not compromise over its territorial integrity.
He said:
Get out of this territory that you have occupied since February 24. This is the first clear step to talking about anything.
Russia is advising its citizens against travelling to the United Kingdom, its foreign ministry said.
The ministry said:
Taking into account the extremely unfriendly course of the UK towards our country, in order to avoid financial losses and other possible problems, we recommend that Russian citizens refrain, if possible, from travelling to the UK and trying to obtain British visas.
Zelenskiy says he is ‘ready to talk to Putin’
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has reiterated an offer to hold direct talks with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, in the Ukrainian president’s fullest public comments on the prospect of peace talks in weeks.
Russia’s withdrawal from Ukraine should be a starting point for any discussions between the two leaders, Zelenskiy told Italy’s RAI 1 television, Reuters reports.
Zelenskiy said:
As president, I am ready to talk to Putin, but only to him. Without any of his intermediaries. And in the framework of dialogue, not ultimatums.
Ukraine and Russia have not held face-to-face talks since 29 March. Interfax news agency has quoted Moscow’s chief negotiator, Vladimir Medinsky, as saying peace talks were being held remotely.
Zelenskiy also ruled out suggestions that Ukraine should make concessions for the sake of securing a peace agreement that would allow Putin to save face, adding that Ukraine would not compromise over its territorial integrity.
He said:
Get out of this territory that you have occupied since February 24. This is the first clear step to talking about anything.
Russia said it expelled 10 Romanian diplomats in response to similar expulsions by Bucharest, its foreign ministry said.
In a separate statement, the ministry said a member of the Bulgarian embassy was also being expelled.
Germany says it has started training Ukrainian soldiers in the use of the Panzerhaubitze (PzH) 2000 artillery system this week.
The PzH 2000 howitzer is one of the most powerful artillery weapons in the Bundeswehr inventories and can hit targets at a distance of 40km (25 miles).
Good morning! Training of Ukrainian soldiers in use of the PzH 2000 started in Germany this week. The delivery of 12 of these weapon systems is currently being coordinated and organised with the Netherlands. We are also reinforcing #NATO’s eastern flank.👇 https://t.co/XylsiFfy7S pic.twitter.com/G44q6rZPvm
— Germany at NATO (@GermanyNATO) May 13, 2022
The Kremlin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, has been speaking to reporters during his regular briefing. Referring to a report in a Finnish newspaper that Russia may cut gas supplies to Finland as soon as today, Peskov said it was “most likely” “another newspaper hoax”.
Iltalehti reported yesterday that Finnish politicians had been warned that Russia could halt gas supplies to its neighbour on Friday. The newspaper cited unnamed sources and did not say where the warning came from.
Peskov said there were no plans to cut Finland off from gas supplies today, adding that Gazprom remained a reliable gas supplier, Reuters reports.
He also hit back at calls by Poland’s prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, to “root out” Russia’s “monstrous ideology”.
In a column for Britain’s Telegraph newspaper on Tuesday, Morawiecki said the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, was more dangerous than either Adolf Hitler or Josef Stalin because of the advanced weapons at his disposal.
Peskov told reporters:
This is the quintessence of that hatred towards Russians that has regrettably, like a metastasis, infected the entire Polish leadership and, in many ways, Polish society.
He said Morawiecki’s “shocking” statement was “hysterical and unacceptable”.
Russian president Vladimir Putin held a phone call with German chancellor Olaf Scholz, in which Putin “outlined in detail the logic and main objectives of the special military operation”, the Kremlin said on Friday.
According to the Kremlin’s readout of the call, Putin also spoke about the “measures being taken to ensure the safety of civilians” during what the Kremlin calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine.
The Kremlin further said that Putin drew attention to the “gross violations” committed by Ukrainian militants “professing the Nazi ideology”. The Russian leader added that the current Russian-Ukrainian negotiations were “effectively blocked” by Kyiv.
During the conversation, the leaders agreed to hold further talks soon, the Kremlin said.
A Russian soldier has appeared in the dock at the first war crime trial of Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine.
The defendant, who arrived at Kyiv’s small district court No 3 in a grey tracksuit and handcuffs, is Vadim Shysimarin, a 21-year-old commander of the Kantemirovskaya tank division, who is in Ukrainian custody charged with murdering a 62-year-old man.
It was a preliminary hearing and a first date for trial has been set for 18 May.
Shysimarin’s lawyer said his client had confessed to the killing of the victim but that he had not yet discussed whether he would plead guilty.
Shysimarin spoke briefly to confirm his name and that he understood the charges against him.
It is alleged that Shysimarin, a sergeant, had been fighting in the Sumy region in north-east Ukraine when he killed a civilian on 28 February in the village of Chupakhivka.
He is accused of shooting at a civilian car after his convoy of military vehicles had come under attack from Ukrainian forces. He then drove the car away with four other soldiers as he sought to flee Ukrainian fighters.
Shysimarin shot dead the unarmed man, who was on a bicycle and talking on his phone, after being ordered “to kill a civilian so he would not report them to Ukrainian defenders”, according to prosecutors.
The crime is said to have happened “dozens of metres” from the victim’s house and was committed using an AK-74 rifle.
The name of the 62-year-old victim was not made public.
Germany’s agriculture minister, Cem Özdemir, described grain theft by Russia in eastern Ukraine as “repugnant” as G7 countries met to discuss the impact of the war on the global food supply.
Özdemir was speaking to reporters at the start of a meeting in Stuttgart with colleagues from G7 countries, Ukraine, the EU, the OECD and the UN’s food and agricultural agency, Reuters reports.
Özdemir said:
This is an especially repugnant form of war that Russia is leading.
Russia was “stealing, robbing, taking for itself grain from eastern Ukraine,” Oezdemir said, describing it as an “economic war”.
Ukraine’s agriculture minister, Mykola Solsky, said his country was in a “very difficult situation” with regard to grain exports, adding:
We cannot get away from the fact that the harvest will be smaller than last year.
UK announces new sanctions targeting Putin’s family and inner circle
Britain announced its latest round of sanctions targeting the Russian president’s financial network, including his ex-wife, family and inner circle.
The sanctions are aimed at the “shady network propping up Putin’s luxury lifestyle”, British foreign secretary, Liz Truss, said in a statement.
The 12 new names added to the British sanctions list include the former first lady of the Russian Federation and ex-wife of Putin, Lyudmila Ocheretnaya.
Mikhail Shelomov, a Russian business owner and the leader’s first cousin, once removed, has also been targeted.
Several other relatives of Putin holding executive positions at major Russian firms like Gazprom have also been sanctioned. They face asset freezes and travel bans.
Truss’ statement read:
We are exposing and targeting the shady network propping up Putin’s luxury lifestyle and tightening the vice on his inner circle.
We will keep going with sanctions on all those aiding and abetting Putin’s aggression until Ukraine prevails.
Putins’ official assets are modest, according to the UK Foreign Office, with his lifestyle “funded by a cabal of family, friends and elites”.
Britain’s sanctioned list now includes more than 1,000 individuals and 100 entities.
Hello, it’s Léonie Chao-Fong with you again today. Feel free to get in touch on Twitter or via email if you have anything you’d like to flag.
