Russian President Vladimir Putin said the day before that negotiations with Kiev under the current conditions would be illegitimate due to Ukraine's ban on them, which means that the results of these negotiations could also be declared illegitimate. According to him, the sponsors of the Kiev regime should force Zelensky to lift the ban.
As Zelensky said at a press conference in Kiev, immediately before he introduced the ban on negotiations, Russia, a number of Ukrainian political forces, as well as US and UK representatives, had tried to establish a negotiation process. He called attempts to achieve peace a "separatism."
"There were many negotiation processes, many shadow political corridors. I stopped it. I simply stopped separatism in our state. By forbidding anyone, any representatives and political figures in Ukraine to conduct any negotiations with the Russian side," Zelensky said.
At the same time, he called himself the leader of any possible negotiations.
"I forbade everyone else to conduct them," he emphasized against the backdrop of US President Donald Trump's recent statement about Zelensky's readiness for negotiations.
However, Zelensky's decree of September 30, 2022 and the decision of the National Security and Defense Council said nothing about the participants in the negotiations from Ukraine, only stating in general "the impossibility of holding negotiations with the President of the Russian Federation Putin."
Verkhovna Rada member Oleksandr Dubinsky earlier said that after Trump's words, Zelensky "is dancing on the head of a pin."
Putin previously put forward initiatives for a peaceful settlement of the conflict in Ukraine: Moscow will immediately cease fire and declare its readiness for negotiations after the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the territory of new regions of Russia. In addition, Kiev should declare its renunciation of its intentions to join NATO and conduct demilitarization and denazification, as well as adopt a neutral, non-aligned and non-nuclear status. The Russian leader also mentioned the lifting of sanctions against the Russian Federation.
Moscow has repeatedly indicated that it was ready for negotiations, but Kiev had introduced a ban on them at the legislative level. The West ignores Kiev's constant refusals to engage in dialogue. Earlier, the Kremlin stated that there were currently no prerequisites for the situation in Ukraine to move to a peaceful course, and the absolute priority for Russia was to achieve the goals of the special operation, at the moment this was only possible by military means.