Key Points
- Vladimir Putin said he agrees with US proposal for a ceasefire in Ukraine but details need to be discussed.
- Putin’s support for the ceasefire appears to rule out a swift ceasefire.
- Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Putin was preparing to reject the ceasefire proposal but was afraid to tell Donald Trump.
Russian President Vladimir Putin says Russia agrees with the United States proposal for a ceasefire in Ukraine but that any ceasefire would have to deal with the root causes of the conflict and many details need to be sorted out.
Putin sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in 2022, triggering the biggest confrontation between Russia and the West since the depths of the Cold War.
Putin’s cautious backing of the US ceasefire proposal seemed aimed at signaling goodwill to the US and paving the way for further talks with President Donald Trump.
But the sheer number of clarifications and conditions he said were needed appeared to rule out a swift ceasefire.
“We agree with the proposals to cease hostilities,” Putin told reporters at a news conference in the Kremlin overnight, following talks with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.
“But we proceed from the fact that this cessation should be such that it would lead to long-term peace and would eliminate the original causes of this crisis,” Putin said.
He went on to list a slew of issues he said needed clarifying and thanked Trump, who says he wants to be remembered as a peacemaker, for his efforts to end the war.
Both Russia and the US now cast the conflict as a deadly proxy war that could have escalated into World War Three.
Trump, who said he was willing to talk to Putin over the phone, called his statement “very promising” and said he hoped Russia would “do the right thing”.
Trump said Steve Witkoff, his special envoy, was engaged in serious talks with the Russians in Moscow on the US proposal, which Ukraine has already agreed to.
He said those discussions would show if Russia was ready to make a deal.
“Now we’re going to see whether or not Russia is there, and if they’re not, it’ll be a very disappointing moment for the world,” Trump said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Putin was preparing to reject the ceasefire proposal but was afraid to tell Trump.
“That’s why in Moscow they are imposing upon the idea of a ceasefire these conditions, so that nothing happens at all, or so that it cannot happen for as long as possible,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address.
Any delay would give Russia more time for its troops to push the last Ukrainian forces out of western Russia as it sticks to demands that Ukraine permanently cede territory claimed by Russia, a position that Ukraine rejects.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
The West and Ukraine describe Russia’s 2022 invasion as an imperial-style land grab, and have repeatedly vowed to defeat Russian forces.
Russian forces control nearly a fifth of Ukraine’s territory and have been edging forward since mid-2024.
Putin portrays the conflict as part of an existential battle with the West which he says humiliated Russia after the Berlin Wall fell in 1989 by enlarging the NATO military alliance and encroaching on what he considers Russia’s sphere of influence, including Ukraine.
Putin said Russian forces were moving forward along the entire frontline and that the ceasefire would have to ensure Ukraine did not seek to use it simply to regroup.
“How can we and how will we be guaranteed that nothing like this will happen? How will control [of the ceasefire] be organised?” Putin questioned. “These are all serious questions.”
Over recent days, Russia has launched a swift offensive in the western region of Kursk against Ukrainian forces, who breached the border in August in an attempt to divert Russia’s military from eastern Ukraine, gain a bargaining chip, and embarrass Putin.
