Putin: Zelensky has placed Ukraine under external management
Russian President Vladimir Putin said he did not see any urgency in meeting with Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky but did not refuse it.
"Why meet with Zelensky, if he gave his country under full external management. Key issues of Ukraine's life are solved not in Kyiv, but in Washington, partly - in Berlin and Paris. What's there to talk about? Nevertheless, I do not refuse meetings of this kind, we just need to understand what to talk about," Putin said during the annual TV program "Direct Line with Putin".
On June 14, in an interview with Western media, Zelensky said that a meeting with Putin was "inevitable."
On April 20, the Ukrainian President invited Putin to meet anywhere in the Donbas. The Russian President said in response that Zelensky should first hold peace talks with the leaders of the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People’s republics, and if he wants to talk about Russian-Ukrainian relations, he can come to Moscow at any time. Zelensky called this condition unacceptable. According to him, he wants to meet with Putin, “not with terrorists”.
Subsequently, the media reported that Zelensky and Putin could meet in Jerusalem.
At the end of May, the Kremlin said that contacts regarding the possible meeting of Russian and Ukrainian presidents are continuing, but the timing of such a meeting has not yet been determined.
The last time Zelensky met with the Russian president was in 2019 at the Normandy Four summit.