Biden not intending to speak to Russia’s Putin until conditions for talks exist

KYIV - US President Joe Biden does not intend to speak to his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, about ending the war in Ukraine as conditions for such discussions currently do not exist, the White House said on Friday.

“We’re just not at a point now where talks seem to be a fruitful avenue to approach right now,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters.

His comment underscored the chasm between Ukraine and its main backer and Russia on negotiations more than nine months into

the war ignited by Mr Putin’s full-scale invasion

that has killed tens of thousands, uprooted millions and destroyed cities and towns.

Mr Kirby was responding to a question about Mr Biden’s statement - made after a White House meeting on Thursday with French President Emmanuel Macron - that

he would talk with Mr Putin

“if in fact there is an interest in him deciding he’s looking for a way to end the war.”

The Kremlin, responding on Friday to Mr Biden’s apparent overture, said the West must recognise

Moscow’s declared annexation

in September of “new territories” from Ukraine before any talks with Mr Putin.

“The president of the Russian Federation has always been, is and remains open to negotiations in order to ensure our interests,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

Mr Kirby, restating US policy, said only Ukraine could determine if and when there could be a negotiated settlement. Kyiv says peace talks are only possible if Russia halts its attacks and withdraws from all Ukrainian territories it seized.

State Department spokesman Ned Price said the United States would continue providing military assistance to Ukraine with the aim of forcing Russia into genuine peace talks and bolstering Kyiv’s position in any negotiations.

Mr Mykhailo Podolyak, a political adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, told Reuters that Russia’s offers of talks were “an illusion” and that it was “deliberately distorting” Mr Biden’s comments.

There was an “absolute consensus” among Western states, he said, that there could be no direct talks with Mr Putin and that any negotiations with Moscow could be held only if it met Ukraine’s demand for a complete troop pullout.

Russia previously has said it is open to peace talks. Ukraine and allies fear any ceasefire without a total withdrawal would let Russian forces recover from a string of losses and regroup for further attacks.

Mr Peskov said Russia will not pull out of Ukraine.

He added that the search for ways to end the war was hindered by the US refusal to recognise Russia’s territorial annexations. Mr Putin proclaimed Ukraine’s southern Kherson region and three other partly occupied provinces part of Russia, a move condemned as illegal by most countries.

Mr Biden has not spoken directly with Mr Putin since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb 24. In March, he branded Mr Putin a “butcher” who “cannot stay in power”.

However, he has signalled in recent weeks that Washington would like to entice Mr Putin onto a diplomatic off ramp, after months of battlefield losses.

Some contacts

Some contacts have been sustained between the sides, often through third parties including Turkey and Saudi Arabia. A deal that partially lifted a Russian naval blockade of Black Sea ports has allowed some grains shipments out of Ukraine, and another agreement on Russian fertilisers is in the works. Several large prisoner of war swaps have occurred.

But the fighting has persisted unabated in Ukraine’s east and south.

With winter tightening its grip, Western countries are working to boost aid to help Ukraine withstand Russian missile and drone attacks on energy infrastructure that have left millions without heat, electricity and water.

In the east, the town of Bakhmut is now the main target of Moscow’s artillery attacks, while Russian forces in Kherson and the Zaporizhzhia region remain on the defensive, Ukraine’s General Staff said in its latest update.

In a bid to reduce the money available for Moscow’s war effort, the European Union has tentatively

agreed to a US$60 a barrel price cap

on Russian seaborne oil, diplomats said. The measure will need to be approved formally by all EU governments over the weekend.

The chair of the Russian lower house’s foreign affairs committee, Mr Leonid Slutsky, told Tass news agency the EU was jeopardising its own energy security with the cap, and violating the laws of the market.

Mr Putin told German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in a phone call that the Western line on Ukraine was “destructive” and urged Berlin to rethink its approach, the Kremlin said.

In Berlin’s readout on the call, Mr Scholz’s spokesman said the Chancellor had condemned Russian air strikes on civilian infrastructure and called for a diplomatic solution to the war “including a withdrawal of Russian troops.”

Mr Putin has said he has no regrets about launching what he calls a “special military operation” to disarm and “denazify” Ukraine. Ukraine and the West say Mr Putin has no justification for what they cast as an imperial-style war of occupation.

Attack deaths

Three people were killed and seven wounded in Russian shelling of the Kherson region over the past 24 hours, the regional governor said on Friday.

The regional capital of Kherson - recaptured by Ukrainian forces in mid-November - and other parts of the region were bombarded 42 times in the same period, Governor Yaroslav Yanushevych wrote on the Telegram messaging app.

Meanwhile, Russian-installed officials in Donetsk said three people died on Friday after Ukrainian forces shelled the eastern Ukrainian city.

Reuters could not independently confirm battlefield reports.

In a grisly development, several Ukrainian embassies abroad

received packages containing animal eyes,

Ukraine’s foreign ministry said on Friday, after a series of letter bombs were sent to sites in Spain including Kyiv’s embassy in Madrid. REUTERS