Kremlin: Ukraine must accept Russia’s conditions and renounce integration with the West to end the war.

The head of the Russian negotiation delegation, Vladimir Medinsky, said that if Kyiv does not agree to “compromises”, it will face new territorial losses.

“We want peace. But if Ukraine continues to be guided by the national interests of other countries, we will simply be forced to respond,” Medinsky stated.

Putin’s aide also noted that Russia’s war with Ukraine is “a fratricidal struggle between states with a common language and culture, which are doomed to be close allies.” “Unfortunately, this conflict deepens our differences, and therefore we want it to end as soon as possible,” Medinsky said.

However, Bloomberg reported in May that Putin was not planning to end the war, counting on the expectation that by the end of the year his army will be able to break through Ukrainian defenses and completely occupy the Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions. He also ordered the establishment of a “security buffer zone” along the Russian-Ukrainian border in the Kharkiv and Sumy regions.

Russian leadership further claimed that Moscow is considering the option of seizing new Ukrainian territories, such as part of the Dnipropetrovsk region, with a subsequent offer of an “exchange” for Kherson and Zaporizhzhia.