The US State Department denounced the Kremlin's proposal to establish a “demilitarized” zone between Russian territory and the front lines in Ukraine, an idea proposed by Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier this week.
“I have difficulty understanding how a demilitarized zone could be implemented between Russia and Ukraine when Russian forces are currently located inside Ukraine,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters at a news conference on Thursday. He added: “It is somewhat difficult to have a demilitarized zone when Russian forces continue their operations on the Ukrainian side of the border.”
During a meeting with his so-called election “agents” on Wednesday, Putin called for the more than 600-mile-long front line to be moved deep into Ukrainian territory to create a buffer zone between the fighting and Russian territory, including Moscow-occupied areas in southern and eastern Ukraine. Eastern Ukraine. The goal would be to put Russian territory beyond the range of Ukraine's front lines and long-range artillery systems.
Alexander Kazakov/Pool/AFP via Getty Images
But Miller told reporters during a news conference on Thursday that Putin had “made clear” that Moscow's goals remain the same since launching its all-out invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, which is to “invade and subjugate Ukraine.”
“So I think… if Russia really wants to show interest in a demilitarized zone, the thing they could do is start demilitarizing the parts of Ukraine where there are currently Russian forces,” Miller added.
Newsweek I reached out to the Russian Ministry of Defense via email for comment on Friday evening.
Oleksiy Danilov, Secretary of Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council, also rejected Putin's proposal on Friday, saying that a demilitarized zone would be created after the end of the war in Ukraine, but that it would follow “completely different parallels and longitudes” than those proposed. By Putin.
“This demilitarized zone will extend to Moscow and even St. Petersburg, and we will definitely move it,” Danilov said, according to a report by Ukrainian Radio Espresso. “Believe me, it will definitely happen. Because the reaction of the civilized world to the crimes committed by these terrorists is led by the modern era [Adolf] “Hitler called Putin will not escape punishment, they will certainly be held accountable.”
Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, have shown no signs that either country is willing to discuss negotiations to end the nearly two-year-old war. The Kremlin leader said Moscow would end its “special military operation” after achieving “denazification” and “demilitarization” in Ukraine. Putin also demanded that Ukraine remain neutral, meaning that Kiev must abandon its plans to join NATO and the European Union.
Zelensky said last month that Ukraine would continue to fight the “tyranny” of the Russian invasion. The Ukrainian leader said the war could not end unless all territory was returned to Kiev's control.
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