New Delhi: A top Ukrainian official said Monday that both Ukraine and Russia were continuing diplomatic engagement to end the war, even after Russia expanded its offensive to western Ukraine, on the Polish border.
Presidential adviser Maikhailo Podiliak tweeted: “On Monday, March 14, a negotiating session will be held to sum up the preliminary results…”
He said negotiations have continued “nonstop in the format of video conferences”. “Working groups are constantly functioning. A large number of issues require constant attention,” he said in his tweet.
Russia on Sunday attacked Ukraine’s Yavoriv International Centre for Peacekeeping and Security, 25 kilometres from the Polish border, killing 35 people and wounding 134.
Reuters said the base had previously hosted NATO military instructors.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his Ukrainian counterpart, Dmytro Kuleba, also discussed ways to stop Russia’s attack, the State Department told the news agency.
In a video posted online Sunday, Podiliak said: “We will not concede in principle on any positions. Russia now understands this. Russia is already beginning to talk constructively.”
“I think we will achieve some results literally in a matter of days,” he said.
Russia has said it can stop the war “in a moment” if Ukraine agreed to its main conditions — acknowledge Crimea as Russian territory, and recognise Donetsk and Lugansk as independent states.
Thousands have died since 24 February and over 2.5 million have fled Ukraine after Russian President Vladimir Putin launched what he called a “special military operation” to “rid Ukraine of nationalists and Nazis”.
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