The Kremlin has said there will be no negotiations on the five captured Ukrainian regions as they dictate what they will have to the US and the West.
The Kremlin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday the Crimean peninsula, Dontesk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia were annexed by Moscow in September 2022, even though they do not occupy all of these territories.
Peskov said that as far as Vladimir Putin and Moscow is concerned these territories are now “an inseparable part” of Russia as they are now part of Russia’s constitution.
During a phone briefing Russian state Meduza media outlet reported Peskov saying, “This is undeniable and non-negotiable.”
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The Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also dictated on 26 February that Moscow will not allow these territories to be discussed.
The Kyiv Independent reported, Lavrov said at a press conference, “Some say: ‘Okay, let’s leave the line of contact. This is Russian, and this is Ukrainian.’ This will not happen.”
Lavrov justified Russia’s claims to these territories saying it was “will of the people,” meaning Putin’s will.
Lavrov also said there will be no British or European troops in the occupied territories as residents “find it more convenient to speak Russian.”
He then claimed that resident of the annexed territories want to keep to their cultural traditions and “such simple mechanical things as the deployment of [foreign] troops will not do – we need to talk about the root causes.”
Tass reported that Tigran Meloyan, an analyst at the HSE Center for Mediterranean Studies believes the UK will challenge Trump’s efforts to settle the conflict by increasing assistance to Kyiv so that hostilities will continue.
He also claimed the UK will undermine the settlement process by sending European troops to Ukraine which Moscow strongly opposes and this could stop all peace negotiations, even though Trump is so far backing peacekeepers in Ukraine.
Meloyan said, “It’s worth noting though that this initiative was put forward by Great Britain, not an EU-member state, and France but was never supported by the others in the EU.”
Starmer was asked if Putin will agree to European peacekeepers, he said, “I’m not answering to Putin.
“I’m considering how we preserve peace in Europe and how we get a lasting peace in Ukraine.
“And I’m absolutely convinced that we need a lasting peace, not a ceasefire, and for that to happen we need security guarantees.”
