Putin says his campaign in Ukraine will not end until Kyiv stops fighting
Categories: FOREIGN COUNTRIES
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Sunday his campaign in Ukraine was going according to plan and would not end until Kyiv stopped fighting, as efforts to evacuate the heavily bombarded city of Mariupol failed for the second day in a row.He made the comments in a phone call with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, who appealed for a ceasefire in the conflict that the United Nations says has created the fastest-growing refugee crisis in Europe since World War Two. He told Erdogan he was ready for dialogue with Ukraine and foreign partners but any attempt to draw out negotiation would fail, a Kremlin statement said.Putin earlier listed “demilitarisation” and “denazification” of Ukraine, recognition of Crimea as part of Russia, and recognition of the separatist regions in eastern Ukraine as independent states as the Kremlin’s main demands.The news dashed hopes of progress in easing, much less ending, the war in Ukraine, which is now in its 11 day and has caused 1.5 million people to flee the country. Russian troops have already taken control of the Zaporizhzhia plant in Ukraine, as well as Chernobyl, the site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster.“This is likely to represent an effort to break Ukrainian morale,” the ministry said. “Russia has used similar tactics in Chechnya in 1999 and Syria in 2016, employing both air and ground-based munitions.” The death toll of the conflict is difficult to measure. The UN human rights office said at least 351 civilians have been confirmed killed, but the true number is probably much higher. Russian and Ukrainian defense officials have not provided information on their military causalities.Ukraine’s military is vastly outmatched by Russia’s, but its professional and volunteer forces have fought back with fierce tenacity.