Russian President Vladimir Putin stated on Thursday that Russia will take full control of Ukraine’s Donbas region by military force unless Ukrainian forces withdraw, a demand Kyiv has firmly rejected.
“Either we liberate these territories by force of arms, or Ukrainian troops leave these territories,” Putin said in an interview with India Today, ahead of a visit to New Delhi, according to a clip broadcast on Russian state television.
The Donbas, comprising Donetsk and Luhansk, has been a flashpoint since Russian-backed separatists first clashed with Ukrainian forces eight years ago. Russia sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in February 2022, escalating the conflict into Europe’s deadliest war since World War II.
As reported in Reuters, Ukraine maintains it will not cede territory that Russia has failed to capture on the battlefield. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has repeatedly said Moscow should not be rewarded for initiating the war.
Currently, Russia controls 19.2% of Ukraine, including Crimea, annexed in 2014, all of Luhansk, over 80% of Donetsk, roughly 75% of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, and small portions of Kharkiv, Sumy, Mykolaiv, and Dnipropetrovsk regions. About 5,000 square kilometers (1,900 square miles) of Donetsk remain under Ukrainian control.
In ongoing U.S.-mediated discussions over a potential peace framework, Russia has insisted on controlling the entirety of Donbas and has sought informal recognition of its authority over the region. In 2022, Moscow declared the Ukrainian regions of Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia as Russian territory following referenda widely dismissed by Kyiv and Western nations as illegitimate. Most countries continue to recognize these regions, along with Crimea, as part of Ukraine.
On Tuesday, Putin met with U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner at the Kremlin, describing the discussions as “very useful” and based on proposals he had discussed with former U.S. President Donald Trump in Alaska in August. Russia indicated it had accepted some U.S. proposals, while negotiations continue.
