The Russian president also accused Western allies of fueling hostilities, charging that “the West wants to fight us to the last Ukrainian.” “It’s a tragedy for the Ukrainian people, but it seems to be heading in that direction,” he said during a meeting with leaders of the Kremlin-controlled parliament. “Everyone should know that to a large extent, we haven’t even started anything serious.” He insisted that Russia remains ready to sit down for talks to end the fighting – but that “those who refuse to do so should know that the longer it goes on the harder it will be for them to make a deal with us”. “We hear they want to defeat us on the battlefield,” he added. “Let them try.” The Kremlin wants Kyiv to recognize Russian sovereignty over the Crimean peninsula it annexed from Ukraine in 2014. It is also demanding independence for Moscow-backed separatist regions in eastern Ukraine and acceptance of the status quo on the ground – a reference to other land gains it has made since troops invaded on February 24. After failing to capture Kyiv and other major cities in northeastern Ukraine early in the campaign, the Russian military turned its focus to Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland, Donbas, where Moscow-backed separatists have been fighting Ukrainian troops since 2014. . Earlier this week, the Russian military claimed control of Luhansk province, one of the two regions that make up Donbas, and is preparing to launch its assault on the second, Donetsk region. Key developments: • Ukrainian flag flies again over Snake Island • Western artillery operating ‘very powerfully’, says President Zelenskyy • Representatives from G20 countries including Russia gather in Bali • Heavy shelling along frontline in Donetsk, but no advance by either side, says UK Foreign Office• Ukraine feels ‘betrayed’ as giving up territory ‘not an option’, says Kyiv mayor In the early stages of the conflict, Russia gained control of the southern Kherson region and part of neighboring Zaporizhzhia. Moscow is expected to try to eventually cut off Ukraine from the Black Sea coast to the Romanian border. Mr Putin reaffirmed his long-held claim that the West is using the conflict in Ukraine to try to isolate and weaken Russia. “They just don’t need a country like Russia,” he said. “That’s why they used terrorism, separatism and internal destructive forces in our country.” He charged that Western sanctions against Russia had failed to achieve their goal of “sowing division and discord in our society and degrading the morale of our people.” Follow the Daily podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify or Spreaker Read more: Hit, Hit, Hit, Destroy: Russia’s Scary Tactics in Donbass What will happen to Donbass now that Luhansk has fallen to Russia? “The march of history is unstoppable and the efforts of the collective West to impose its version of world order are doomed to failure.” However, Ukraine’s chief negotiator, Mykhailo Podolyak, rejected these claims. “There is no ‘collective West’ plan. Only a specific army that entered sovereign Ukraine, bombing cities and killing civilians,” he tweeted. “Everything else is primitive propaganda. That’s why Mr. Putin’s mantra of ‘war to the last Ukrainian’ is further evidence of deliberate Russian genocide.”
