US rejects suggestion and Kremlin later clarifies idea is just ‘one of the options’ and has not been raised with Trump
Vladimir Putin has suggested Ukraine could be placed under a temporary UN-led government to organise fresh elections in comments rejected by a US spokesperson.
It was not clear how seriously the Russian president’s comments should be taken, given that a couple of hours later the Kremlin clarified that Putin had not raised this idea in recent phone calls with Donald Trump.
In remarks broadcast on television on Friday morning, Putin said the idea would be to allow Ukraine to “hold democratic elections, to bring to power a viable government that enjoys the trust of the people, and then begin negotiations with them on a peace treaty” – though he later said that was just “one of the options”.
“Under the auspices of the United Nations, with the United States, even with European countries, and, of course, with our partners and friends, we could discuss the possibility of introduction of temporary governance in Ukraine,” Putin said.
The remarks indicate that any negotiated end to the war in Ukraine is some way off as Russia continues to add conditions to achieving a settlement while Kyiv has said it would sign up to a 30 day ceasefire if Moscow agreed.
