“Always demanded diplomacy”: Peskov pointed to Putin’s readiness for negotiations on Ukraine and security issues

Russian President Vladimir Putin is ready to negotiate on issues related to Ukraine and security guarantees.

This was stated by the press secretary of the head of state Dmitry Peskov in a conversation with a journalist from CNN.

“Firstly, President Putin has always demanded negotiations and diplomacy.

And, in fact, he initiated the issue of security guarantees for the Russian Federation.

Ukraine is only part of a larger problem of security guarantees for Russia and, of course, President Putin is ready to negotiate,” Peskov said.

The day before, the head of state held a meeting with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

The topic of the conversation was the US and NATO's response to Russian proposals to provide Moscow with legally secured security guarantees.

According to the Foreign Minister, there is a chance to reach an agreement with Western partners on existing problematic issues.

“Still, our consistent explanatory work and commitment to clarifying our innocence, while being ready to listen to some serious counter-arguments - it seems to me that our possibilities are far from being exhausted.

Of course, they should not continue indefinitely, but at this stage I would suggest that they be continued and increased,” he said.

As Lavrov noted, Moscow's response to the proposals of Washington and Brussels is ready - the draft document is "formulated on ten pages."

Later, Dmitry Peskov indicated that Vladimir Putin would “timely” approve the Russian response to the United States and the North Atlantic Alliance.

“The President has approved the conceptual project presented by Lavrov.

Diplomats are now working on finalizing the text, which will subsequently be sent to the addressees, ”the Kremlin spokesman explained.

Security issues and settlement of the intra-Ukrainian conflict will be the subject of negotiations at the upcoming meeting in Moscow on February 15 between Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

Last week, the head of state discussed this topic in the Kremlin with French President Emmanuel Macron.

Also on russian.rt.com Security guarantees and the Ukrainian question: what topics will Putin and Scholz discuss in Moscow

Meanwhile, Dmitry Polyansky, First Deputy Permanent Representative of Russia to the UN, on the air of the British TV channel Channel 4 said that the Russian Federation has no plans to attack Ukraine, as Western media and the United States claim.

According to him, these are “ridiculous and strange” statements.

“We said from the very beginning that diplomacy should prevail.

The topic of Russia's military activity on the border was artificially inflated.

There is nothing unusual about this.

The only crisis that is currently observed is provoked by Western countries, including the fact that they evacuate their embassies and make a fuss about Russia's alleged plans to attack.

This is the only crisis here,” he added.

In turn, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, appreciated the appeal of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to civil servants and oligarchs, who urged them to return to the country.

“It became clear that the enemy of this state is not Russia.

The enemy of Ukraine is its “elite.

After the President of Ukraine announced that the announcement of the date of the “invasion” is intimidation, it became clear that the friend of this state is not the United States,” she wrote in her Telegram channel.

We add that the officials of the United States of America continue to escalate the situation around Ukraine.

So, the day before, the American embassy was transferred from Kiev to Lvov.

Chargé d'Affaires a.i. in Ukraine Christina Quinn and most of the diplomatic staff have already arrived in the city in the west of the country.

At the same time, American citizens are persistently urged to leave not only the territory of Ukraine, but also neighboring Belarus and Transnistria.

The main reason is allegedly worrying Russian military activity around Ukraine.

Against this background, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that a decision had been made to provide Ukraine with lethal weapons worth about $6.1 million. According to the Canadian Ministry of Defense, Ottawa will provide Kiev with rifles, machine guns, pistols and 1.5 million rounds of ammunition.

Russian Ambassador to Ottawa Oleg Stepanov called Canada's actions unacceptable and called instead to "use its special influence on the Kiev authorities to sit them at the negotiating table" with the Donbass republics, as well as "encourage the full and unquestioning implementation of the Minsk Package of Measures."

“By providing weapons, Western countries are pushing the Kiev regime to continue the war against its own people,” TASS quoted him as saying.