Putin is ready for dialogue to end the war in Ukraine, but on his three conditions
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday he was ready to hold talks with Ukraine, but insisted that Kyiv meet Moscow's demands, as several diplomatic efforts trying to defuse the crisis between the two countries failed.
Putin told German Chancellor Olaf Scholz that Ukraine must agree to disarm, accept Moscow's sovereignty over Crimea, and hand over territory to Russian-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine, the Kremlin said in a statement on Friday.
Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimea peninsula in 2014, following the ouster of the pro-Moscow former Ukrainian president, and backed rebels in eastern Ukraine.
Putin recently recognized the separatist regions of Lugansk and Donetsk in eastern Ukraine as independent states, and then launched military operations in the neighboring country on February 24.
Russia attributed the launch of military operations in Ukraine to rid the country of what it said were the "Nazi elite" that committed violations and persecution against belonging to Russian nationalism.
Russia moved militarily in Ukraine, in order to prevent the latter from joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization "NATO", whose expansion in Eastern Europe is seen by Moscow as an "existential threat".
On Thursday, Ukrainian and Russian negotiators held the second round of talks, and reached a preliminary agreement on providing safe corridors to allow civilians to leave besieged Ukrainian cities and deliver humanitarian supplies.
They also agreed to continue negotiating ways to settle the conflict, but the developments of the conflict do not suggest that a solution is imminent.
Ukrainian negotiators said the two sides planned to hold another round of talks at the end of this week.
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