Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned Moscow will take Ukrainian territory by force if Kyiv’s troops do not withdraw, signaling rigidity over a key sticking point in peace talks.
“Either we liberate these territories by force of arms, or Ukrainian troops leave these territories,” Putin, who is currently on a state visit to India, said in an interview with India Today. The comments, published by Russian state-controlled media, were translated by news agency Reuters and made in reference to Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region.
Russia is estimated to control more than 80% of the Donbas, where fighting between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed separatists started long before Russia’s full-scale invasion of 2022. The war in the region first began in 2014, when Russia invaded and annexed Crimea — a peninsular in southern Ukraine.
Capturing and officially annexing the Donbas region would enable Russia to create a land bridge to Crimea, a crucial military and trading hub for Moscow.
Under occupation, so-called referendums have shown up to 99% of residents in parts of the Donbas region voted to join the Russian Federation. Those referendums have been widely criticized as sham votes by the international community.
