Putin indicated Russia could be open to territory swap as part of Ukraine deal, report says

President Vladimir Putin told some of Russia’s ​top businessmen that he might be open to swapping some territory ‌controlled by Russian forces in Ukraine but that he wanted the ​whole of Donbas, the Kommersant newspaper reported.

U.S., Ukraine reach consensus on key issues, but territorial disputes unresolved

Andrei Kolesnikov, the Kremlin correspondent for the Kommersant, one of Russia’s top newspapers, said that Mr. Putin briefed top businessmen on the details of the plan at a late-night Kremlin meeting on December 24.

“Vladimir Putin asserted that the Russian side is still ready to make the concessions that he made in Anchorage. In other words, that ‘Donbas is ours,’” Kommersant reported.

In ​essence, Mr. Putin wants the whole of Donbas but outside that area “a partial ⁠exchange of territories from the Russian side is not ruled out,” Mr. Kolesnikov wrote in the newspaper.