Ukraine is preparing fresh peace talks with Russia in October – despite the Kremlin insisting it is ‘impossible’ for Vladimir Putin to meet with President Zelensky at the G20 summit.
Mr Zelensky’s chief of staff, Kyrylo Budanov, told Ukrainian media on Saturday the country was readying itself for the prospect of new talks involving Russia and the United States later this year aimed at ending more than four years of war.
Speaking to reporters in Kyiv, Mr Budanov, 40, said Ukraine was ‘getting ready’ for talks, suggesting they could take place as early as October.
The comments come as Mr Putin’s spokesperson, Dmirty Peskov, ruled out the possibility of the Russian leader meeting with the Mr Zelensky, 48, at the G20 summit – despite the Ukrainian President affirming he is open to talks on ending the war.
Rather, Mr Peskov, 58, insisted a meeting could only occur in Russia’s capital, saying ‘it is impossible,’ at the G20 summit or any alternative location.
Speaking to AFP in New Dehli on Saturday, the diplomat said: ‘There is a readiness to meet him [Zelensky] in Moscow.’
Mr Peskov did not confirm if Mr Putin, 73, had been invited to the G20 summit, which will be held from December 14 to 15 in Miami, Florida and see leaders gather from across the globe.
Yet this is just one of numerous offers the Russian leader has rejected for a face-to-face meeting with Mr Zelensky.
Volodymyr Zelensky’s chief of staff told Ukrainian media the country was readying itself for the prospect of new talks involving Russia and the USA aimed at ending the war
Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson, however, has ruled out the possibility of the Russian leader meeting with Zelensky at the G20 summit later this year
In June, the Ukrainian President said he proposed meeting Putin in the United States during a call with Trump, and was waiting to see what came of it.
He also previously said Mr Putin ignored an invitation to meet him at a G7 summit in France the same month.
The rejection comes as Washington has sought to kick-start long-stalled talks on the conflict, with US negotiators visiting Kyiv and Moscow, and President Donald Trump holding talks on the phone with Mr Putin earlier this week.
On Friday, Trump’s special envoy and son-in-law Jared Kushner told a security forum in Kyiv via videolink he hoped to announce the ‘next steps’ of talks to end the war within ‘a couple of weeks’.
Mr Kushner and negotiator Steve Witkoff visited the Ukrainian capital as well as Moscow last weekend.
The United States holds this year’s presidency of the Group of 20 major economies, which comprises 19 countries plus the European Union and the African Union.
Earlier this week, Zelensky told German broadcaster Deutsche Welle he would be willing to meet Mr Putin at the G20 summit if both leaders were invited.
He said: ‘We have to come. We have to meet, to speak, and make decisions. It’s not about words. What I will tell him or what he wants to tell me, it doesn’t matter.’
Washington has sought to kick-start long-stalled talks on the Russo-Ukraine conflict, with President Donald Trump holding talks on the phone with Mr Putin earlier this week
Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner (left) and US envoy Steve Witkoff (second from left) recently met with Putin at the Kremlin
Asked about Ukraine’s position ahead of possible negotiations, Zelensky added: ‘Ukraine now is much more stronger than last year on the battlefield.
‘That’s why we think that we have now (a) good position for negotiations.’
He also confirmed plans to meet President Trump in late September.
The Russo-Ukrainian war, which began in 2014, has claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands – with recent estimates suggesting Russia is losing 6,000 more soldiers than it can recruit every month.
This weekend alone, Russian strikes killed at least seven people and wounded almost 60 across Ukraine.
Ukrainian officials confirmed two people were killed in the southern Zaporizhzhia region and another two in the central Zhytomyr region.
Steelmaker ArcelorMittal said two others were also killed by a missile strike on its plant in the central city of Kryvyi Rih.
‘We emphasise our plant is a civilian facility in the mining and metallurgical industry, and we strongly condemn these insidious enemy attacks,’ the company said, reporting damage at its production facilities.
Russo-Ukrainian war, which began in 2014, has claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands (Pictured: A heavily damaged residential building in Kyvyi Rih, Ukraine, following a Russian strike)
Residents of Kryvyi Rih and the Kyiv regions were injured in Russian air strikes last weekend. (Pictured: A shopping mall damaged following a Russian strike in Kryvyi Rih)
The two victims in the Zhytomyr region were killed when Russia struck a ‘grocery store’ in the city of Zvyagel, some 230 kilometres west of Kyiv, regional leader Vitaliy Bunechko said.
He added the two petrol stations were also hit in Korosten, in the same region further north towards the Belarus border, but there were no casualties.
Ukrainian Prime Minister Sergiy Koretsky said Russia had increased strikes on petrol stations in recent days, both in Kyiv and on motorways, calling for strenghtened security.
Zelensky also confirmed a Russian strike on an apartment building in Odesa wounded 37 people, where rescue teams were searching for two missing people, and another 11 were wounded in Chornomorsk, in the Odesa region.
Others were wounded in the Kryvyi Rih and the Kyiv regions, he said.
He has since called on allies to call out Russia’s intensifying campaign, with fears of what another winter of war will look like.
Mr Zelensky said: ‘When the Russians so blatantly turn ordinary people into targets of their terrorist attacks, it is frustrating that the response from the world’s strongest powers does not match the level of Russia’s escalation.’
Kyiv has also upped its retaliatory strikes inside Russia, as Ukraine’s top spy chief estimates the country has a maximum of two years left to fight.
Lieutenant General Oleh Ivashchenko claimed a loss of troops, dwindling morale and a struggling economy may impact Russia’s ability to wage war by 2028.
Western intelligence services suggest Putin’s nation is losing 6,000 more soldiers than it can recruit every month. Figures produced by Ukraine, meanwhile, estimate that Russia has lost more than 1.5million troops – with as many as 450,000 deaths – since 2022.
Ukraine’s top spy chief estimates Russia has a maximum of two years left to fight (Pictured: Vladimir Putin speaks to members of the media in New Delhi this weekend)
Speaking at the Ukrainian military’s intelligence service headquarters in Kyiv, Ivashchenko told The Times: ‘Russia has military and economic resources for the next year, but we estimate it will end in 2028.
‘Russia recruits roughly 1,000 people every day, sometimes 1,200, but look at these casualty figures. Yesterday it was 1,410, the day before it was 1,511. Of those, around 60 per cent are killed in action.’
Another 18 months of fighting would likely result in a further 765,800 Russian casualties, with 459,480 dead and 306,320 wounded, further statistics suggest.
And such startling figures, according to Ivashchenko, have resulted in a lack of enthusiasm for the war effort across the border in Moscow.
‘Morale is very low because nobody wants to fight,’ he added. ‘Also the morale of the Russian population is very low: most people do not really want war.’
Around 40 per cent of Russia’s oil-refining infrastructure has been disabled, according to the Kyiv Independent, leading to fuel shortages and a ban on exports of diesel and gasoline.
Only this week, reports suggested an oil refinery in Rostov-on-Don as well as three Russian air defence assets were struck by Ukrainian forces in an overnight operation.
It came a matter of days after a fire was recorded at the Ryazan Oil Refinery – one of Russia’s largest oil-processing refineries.
‘The war must hit home. This is important,’ President Zelensky said.
Yet Putin is continuing to increase the number of nuclear warheads in his arsenal – despite insisting Russia posed no threat to Nato allies in Europe.
Over the past year, Russia has increased its stock of nuclear warheads deployed on missiles and bombers by 78 to 1,796, marking a nine-year high, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
Mr Putin has increased the number every year since the beginning of the war with Ukraine in 2022, but the US saw no rise and Britain and France did not deploy additional warheads, with 170 and 280 respectively.
Speaking at the BRICS summit in New Delhi, he said: ‘Now they [the West] are talking about how they are thinking about bringing troops to the territory of Ukraine. This means war with Russia.
‘There is no such threat, and there has never been. We are not threatening European countries, nor are we going to threaten them. Why would we?
‘No one seems to even consider that we have no grounds for any conflict with Europe.’
