The Kremlin says Ukrainian forces will be ‘destroyed’ or pushed out of seized Russian territories.
Russia has rejected trading the Ukrainian territory it occupies for areas in its own western Kursk region held by Kyiv forces, hours after launching a barrage of drones and missiles on the Ukrainian capital that killed one person.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday that accepting the idea floated by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in an interview late on Tuesday was “impossible”.
“Russia has never and will never discuss the topic of exchanging its territory,” he said, saying that Ukrainian forces holding territory inside Russia would either be “destroyed” or pushed out.
Ukraine staged a lightning incursion over the border last August and seized chunks of Kursk. Russian troops are still battling to eject them. Russia, in turn, controls just under 20 percent of Ukraine, or more than 112,000 square kilometres. Ukraine controls about 450 square kilometres of the Kursk region, according to open-source maps of the battlefield.
Zelenskyy said, “We will swap one territory for another,” adding that he did not know which part of Russian-occupied territory Ukraine would ask for back. “I don’t know, we will see. But all our territories are important, there is no priority,” he said.
The Kremlin announcement came after Ukrainian authorities said that one person had been killed and at least four others were wounded – including a child – in an attack on Kyiv that damaged apartment blocks, office buildings and civilian infrastructure.
Russia’s Ministry of Defence said it had carried out a “group missile strike” on Ukrainian military-industrial sites that produce drones and claimed all targets had been hit.
‘Not preparing for peace’
Zelenskyy wrote on social media after the attack that Russian President Vladimir Putin was “not preparing for peace – he continues to kill Ukrainians and destroy cities”.
“Only strong steps and pressure on Russia can stop this terror. Right now we need the unity and the support of all our partners in the fight for a just end to this war,” he added.
Zelenskyy is due to meet US Vice President JD Vance on Friday on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference. US President Donald Trump’s special envoy Keith Kellogg, who is tasked with drawing up a proposal to halt the fighting, is also due to visit Ukraine next week.
Trump took office promising to end the war in Ukraine, possibly by leveraging billions of dollars in US assistance sent under former President Joe Biden, to force Kyiv into territorial concessions.
Trump also said on Monday that Ukraine “may be Russian someday”.