Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that Moscow was in favor of the principle of a ceasefire in the war with Ukraine, as proposed by the US Donald Trump administration, but the Kremlin raised a question that said they needed answers before committing to an armistice, Al Jazera reported.
He said Russia needs to discuss these questions and the terms of the peace proposal with the United States.
His initial comments on the proposed ceasefire drew criticism from Ukraine and sparked a calm response from Trump. If Trump disagrees with a ceasefire, he expressed confidence in Putin’s commitment to a peace deal, and vibrated between threatening Russia with new sanctions.
On Tuesday, the team representing Washington and Kiev met in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, negotiated terms of peace in Ukraine.
After the meeting, the two countries issued a joint statement, proposing an “immediate, interim” 30-day ceasefire on the front.
The statement focused on “swapping prisoners, releasing civil detainees, and forcibly returning Ukrainian children” during the ceasefire period.
The document did not mention sanctions on Russia or Ukraine’s security guarantees, but said that Ukraine’s European allies would “be involved in the peace process.”
The document also did not specify what would happen in the Ukrainian soldiers of Kursk, Russia.
Then, on Thursday, at a press conference alongside Belarus’ President Alexander Lukashenko, Putin responded to the ceasefire proposal.
He said the idea of a ceasefire was “right” and that Russia supported it in principle. “We agree with the proposal to stop hostilities,” he told reporters in Moscow.
However, he added: “I think there’s an issue that we need to discuss and we need to talk about it with our American colleagues and partners.
The Russian president outlined three questions and proposed that solving them in a satisfactory way for Moscow is a prerequisite for the Kremlin to accept a ceasefire.
The first question put forward by Putin involves the Ukrainian military in the Russian region of Kursk.
Last August, Ukrainian forces began a surprising invasion of Kursk and seized the territory.
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