DISINFO: Russia ready for peace talks while Ukraine rejects them
SUMMARY
Russia, the Pope and some other parties have long been calling on Ukraine to start talks, but the Kyiv regime keeps flatly rejecting this idea. Ukraine does not allow the possibility of negotiations, probably because it is drawing on the assurances of many European countries that they are doing everything to inflict an inevitable strategic defeat on Russia.
RESPONSE
Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about peace in Ukraine. This claim was made in the context of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Putin and the Kremlin have a track record of pretending negotiations which are, in fact, just blunt demands for Ukrainian unconditional surrender. We have analysed this disinformation tactic in several articles, especially: "Prepare for winter" (30 Nov. 2023), "Russian so-called ‘peace proposals’ are empty PR stunts" (18 Jan. 2023) , "What He Said and What it Really Means – Vol. 2: “Negotiations” (1. March 2022) and "The Kremlin security demands" (21 Dec. 2021).
Ukraine has repeatedly expressed its readiness for talks with Russia, but only on the condition that Moscow stops its military aggression and withdraws its troops from Ukrainian territory. Russia has so far refused to comply with these conditions.
Contrary to Russian disinformation reports alleging that Ukraine banned any talks with Russia, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a decree in October 2022 banning talks specifically with Putin. Any other Russian officials are welcome if they accept Ukraine’s stance, based on international law.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy presented a 10-point peace plan at a EU-Ukraine summit in February 2023. The EU unequivocally supported Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s peace formula. It is up to Ukraine to decide when it will hold talks with Russia.
The EU Council Conclusions of 09 February 2023 state unequivocally:
"Russia must stop this atrocious war immediately. The European Union will stand by Ukraine with its steadfast support for as long as it takes."
The EU supports Ukraine’s initiative for a just peace, including:
- President Zelenskyy’s peace formula
- Ukraine’s 10-point peace plan
- a peace formula summit.
Commenting on Pope Francis’s words that Ukraine should raise a ‘white flag’ and start talks, European Commission spokesman Peter Stano told a briefing on 11 March 2024 that the EU supports peace on Ukrainian conditions (translated from French): ‘The question of peace is in the hands of one man. The name of this man is Vladimir Putin who started the war and who advances the war every day. So we are of course in favour of peace, peace that is just, peace that is formulated on the terms of the victim of this war, and that is Ukraine.’
Russia has been waging an unprovoked and unjust war of aggression against Ukraine since 24 February 2022. The war was preceded by years of Russian destabilisation efforts in Ukraine, including the illegal annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and the occupation of parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine is a clear violation of international law, including the UN Charter, and is a direct attack on the security and stability of Europe. The EU, the US, and other Western countries have, in addition to supporting Ukraine's self-defence with financial and military aid in accordance to the UN Charter, imposed unprecedented sanctions on Russia in response to its illegal invasion of Ukraine.
Read similar disinformation cases claiming that The West is guilty of disrupting Russia-Ukraine peace deals, that Ukraine is ready to give up territories for peace with Russia, and that West did not want peace, it prodded Ukraine into war.