Russian president says Russians and Ukrainians are one people – which Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly rejected – and warns Moscow could also seize Sumy city. What we know on day 1,214
Vladimir Putin has said he believes the whole of Ukraine is “ours” and warned that advancing Russian forces could take the northern Ukrainian city of Sumy as part of a bid to carve out a buffer zone along the border. Ukraine’s foreign minister denounced the Russian president’s statements on Friday as evidence of Russian “disdain” for US peace efforts and said Moscow was bent on seizing more territory and killing more Ukrainians. Putin, when asked about fresh Russian advances, told the country’s flagship economic forum in St Petersburg that he considered Russians and Ukrainians to be one people and “in that sense the whole of Ukraine is ours”. Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly rejected the notion that Russians and Ukrainians are one people. The Ukrainian president said commanders had discussed Russian action in the Sumy region and “we are holding them back and eliminating these killers”.
Vladimir Putin claimed he was not questioning Ukraine’s independence or its people’s striving for sovereignty but that when Ukraine declared independence as the Soviet Union fell in 1991 it also declared its neutrality. He said Moscow wanted Ukraine to accept the reality on the ground – where Russia now controls about a fifth of Ukraine – if there was to be a chance of peace. Andrii Sybiha, the Ukrainian foreign minister, said on X: “Putin’s cynical statements demonstrate complete disdain for US peace efforts. While the United States and the rest of the world have called for an immediate end to the killing, Russia’s top war criminal discusses plans to seize more Ukrainian territory and kill more Ukrainians.” Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address that Russia had shown “openly and utterly cynically that they ‘don’t feel like’ agreeing to a ceasefire. Russia wants to continue the war.”
