Ukrainian President Zelenskyy willing to meet Russian President Putin to discuss how to end war

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Wednesday that he was only willing to talk directly to Vladimir Putin and not via intermediates. He added that if the Russian President “understands reality” there was the possibility of finding a diplomatic way out of the conflict.

Zelenskyy, speaking to an audience at the World Economic Forum in Davos, also said that Ukraine would fight until it recovered all of its territories. The Ukrainian President said that Moscow should withdraw its troops back to the lines in place before Russia began its invasion on February 24.

“That might be the first step towards talks,” he said, adding that Russia has been playing for time in its talks with Ukraine.

Before this, Zelenskyy had said that arranging any talks with Russia was becoming more difficult in light of what he said was evidence of Russian actions against civilians under occupation. Russia denies targeting civilians in what it calls a “special operation” to degrade Ukraine’s military capabilities.

Russian and Ukrainian negotiators have held sporadic talks since Russian forces poured into Ukraine at the end of February, but both sides say the talks have stalled. Zelenskyy told Ukrainian television last week that it was impossible to halt the war without some sort of diplomacy involved.

In his remarks to the audience in Davos, Zelenskiy also said that war came at a huge human price for Ukrainians. The country’s forces, he said, were making gains, notably near the second city of Kharkiv, but “the bloodiest situation remains in Donbas, where we are losing too many people”.

He added that any notion of recovering by force the Crimea peninsula, seized and annexed by Russia in 2014, would cause hundreds of thousands of casualties.