The official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, commented on the words of former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett that the negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv were interrupted by the Western countries, which at some point decided to “smash Putin, not negotiate.”
“Another confession!” — the diplomat wrote in her Telegram channel on Sunday, February 5.
A day earlier, Bennett, who acted as an intermediary between Moscow and Kyiv at the beginning of the Russian special operation to protect Donbass, gave the first interview since leaving politics in the summer of 2022. On Israeli TV Channel 12, he said that last March he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow at the request of Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky.
Bennett noted that he “fully coordinated all his actions” with the leaders of the United States, Great Britain, Germany and France.
The politician also pointed out that the negotiations on Ukraine were interrupted by the West. He added that both leaders – both Russia and Ukraine – were ready to make concessions until the final decision was made to “smash Putin.”
Prior to that, on January 27, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that US President Joe Biden could quickly end the conflict in Ukraine, if he wanted, by giving instructions to the Kyiv regime. However, according to him, the American leader does not want to use this key, but, on the contrary, chooses the path of further pumping weapons into Ukraine.
The last face-to-face round of negotiations between the Russian Federation and Ukraine took place on March 29, 2022 in Turkey. In October of the same year, Kyiv officially renounced contacts with Moscow. Then the president of the country put into effect the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of the country on the impossibility of holding negotiations with Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
Since February 24, Russia has been conducting a special operation to protect the Donbass, whose residents refused to recognize the results of the 2014 coup d’état in Ukraine. The decision to hold it was made against the background of the aggravation of the situation in the region due to shelling by Ukrainian troops.
