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By Kayode Sanni-Arewa

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday proposed direct negotiations in the coming days to end the conflict in Ukraine but did not address a 30-day ceasefire proposal drawn up hours earlier by European allies of Kyiv, reportedly with US backing.

Speaking at the Kremlin in the early hours of Sunday, Putin proposed direct talks with Ukraine in Istanbul on May 15 — hours after Kyiv and the leaders of France, Germany, Britain and Poland had called for an unconditional 30-day ceasefire to start on Monday.

“We propose to the Kyiv authorities to resume the talks that they broke off in 2022, and, I emphasise, without any preconditions,” Putin said.

Russian and Ukrainian negotiators held direct talks in Istanbul in the first weeks of the conflict, but failed to agree to halt the fighting, which has been raging ever since.

“We propose to start (negotiations) without delay on Thursday May 15 in Istanbul,” Putin said, adding that he would talk to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan soon to ask for his help to facilitate the talks.

Putin said he was “committed to serious negotiations with Ukraine” and that he wanted talks to “eliminate the root causes of the conflict and to establish a long-lasting peace”.

Russia’s references to the “root causes” of the conflict typically refer to grievances with Kyiv and the West that Moscow has put forward as justification for launching the offensive in February 2022.

‘Anti-Russian rhetoric’
“We do not exclude that during these talks we will be able to agree on some new ceasefire,” Putin said in the Kremlin address, attended by AFP.

But he also accused Ukraine’s Western backers of wanting to “continue war with Russia” and — without mentioning the specific Ukraine-European proposal for a 30-day ceasefire — slammed European “ultimatums” and “anti-Russian rhetoric”.

“A potentially great day for Russia and Ukraine!” US President Donald Trump posted on his Truth Social platform shortly afterwards, without specifying what he was referring to.

He vowed to “continue to work with both sides to make sure that it happens”.

But French President Emmanuel Macron, who hours earlier had met with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk in Kyiv in a symbolic show of support for Ukraine, warned that Putin was merely trying “to buy time”.

An unconditional ceasefire is not preceded by negotiations, by definition,” he told reporters as he stepped off a train in the Polish city of Przemysl on his return from Ukraine.

The European leaders, together with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, had pressed Russia in the Kyiv meeting on Saturday to accept a 30-day unconditional ceasefire starting on Monday, threatening Moscow with new sanctions if it did not comply.

The United States and other countries back the proposal, they said.

“We have just now… decided to support a ceasefire which will begin next Monday, without any preconditions,” Macron told a press conference in Kyiv on Saturday.

The leaders also held a video conference with their counterparts from about 20 other member countries of the “coalition of the willing” supporting Ukraine.

“In the event of a violation of this ceasefire, we have agreed that massive sanctions will be prepared and coordinated between Europeans and Americans,” Macron said.

The United States and Ukraine have for weeks pushed a similar proposal, which Russia has not accepted.

Trump had threatened to walk out of talks over the lack of progress on ending the war, after vowing during the US election campaign to halt the conflict within a day of taking office.

Kyiv and its allies had feared that Trump was pivoting towards Moscow because he had clashed with Zelensky. But Trump has recently expressed growing impatience with Putin.

‘Absolute unity’
The UK’s Starmer said the Kyiv talks had led to “absolute unity across a whole range of countries around the world, including the United States, that there must be that 30-day unconditional ceasefire”.

The five leaders in Kyiv held a “fruitful” call with Trump to update him on the meeting, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga said.

“For the first time in a long time we had a feeling that the whole free world is truly united,” Poland’s Tusk said.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen also supported the truce that she said “must be implemented without pre-conditions to pave the way for meaningful peace negotiations”.

Macron said the ceasefire would be “mainly” monitored by the United States but that “Europeans will contribute”.

The symbolic show of European unity came a day after Putin struck a defiant tone at a Moscow parade marking 80 years since the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.

Putin had ordered a unilateral three-day truce from Thursday through to Saturday for the event. But a Ukrainian army brigade operating in the east told AFP the intensity of fighting had remained “pretty much the same”.

AFP