Kyiv, Ukraine. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Ukraine’s intensified strikes deep inside Russia would allow Kyiv to negotiate an end to the war on equal footing. He made the remarks after a barrage hit an oil terminal and naval base hundreds of kilometres away.
Long-range strikes and negotiation stance
For months, Kyiv’s forces have carried out attacks on Russian fossil fuel industry sites, at times daily, with the aim of cutting Moscow’s main source of war funding and pressuring the Kremlin into talks.
Speaking alongside NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte in Kyiv, Zelenskiy told reporters that Ukraine now had security guarantees that would allow it to end the war on equal footing with Russia in any diplomatic format.
He said it was only a matter of time before Ukraine increased the scale of the strikes, which have forced some Russian refineries to suspend operations and, he said, boosted morale among Ukrainians living under the continued threat of Russian drones and missiles for more than four years.
Battlefield developments
As Ukraine has expanded its long-range attacks on Russian territory, analysts say Kyiv’s troops on the battlefield appear to be in their strongest position in years.
They said Russia’s spring offensive was losing momentum, partly because Ukrainian counterattacks had kept Russian gains limited.
Call for direct talks
Zelenskiy said he was ready to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin, repeating Kyiv’s long-held position that only a direct meeting could resolve the main obstacle in the stalled talks, the issue of eastern Donbas.
Russia did not fully occupy the area during its full-scale invasion and has demanded that Ukraine withdraw its troops from parts of the region that remain under Kyiv’s control.
“I am ready for direct talks with Putin to bring this war to an end, rather than waiting for when all will resolve every conflict in the world before our turn finally comes,” Zelenskiy said, in an apparent reference to U.S.-brokered talks and the current U.S. focus on its war on Iran.