Russian President Vladimir Putin has ruled out negotiations with Kiev over Ukraine’s counterattack on Russian territory, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Monday.
“The president said very clearly that after attacks or even raids in the Kursk region, any talks are impossible,” Lavrov told Russian state television during Putin’s visit to Azerbaijan.
Lavrov also said that Putin would soon give an assessment of the situation. Reports of contacts between the warring parties, which were established through intermediaries such as Qatar or Turkey, were nothing more than rumors, Lavrov added.
The Russian president’s current silence on the crisis in his own military is not new. When faced with previous defeats, Putin spoke out only after a long pause and sometimes after sitting out the crisis.
Zelensky says Kiev now controls a large area in Russia
Ukraine, which has been battling a large-scale Russian invasion for nearly two and a half years, launched a counteroffensive about two weeks ago, advancing into the western Russian region of Kursk.
Ukraine has made further progress in its counteroffensive, President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Monday.
“At the moment, our forces control more than 1,250 square kilometers of enemy territory and 92 settlements,” Zelensky said during a speech to Ukrainian diplomats and officials.
Zelensky’s figures on territorial gains exceed most previous estimates by military observers and are difficult to confirm. Most experts admit that their estimates are incorrect due to the limited amount of visual material. In particular, the Ukrainian armed forces publish very little so as not to jeopardize their advance.
Zelensky noted that an important tactical goal, reducing the threat to Ukraine’s Sumy border region, had been successfully achieved.
He described the offensive as a major success and said critics would view a counteroffensive on Russian soil as crossing “the strictest of all red lines that Russia has.”
This is the first time that Kiev has moved the war to its opponent’s territory. Russia continues to occupy large parts of eastern and southern Ukraine.
Before the Ukrainian counterattack, Putin had demanded that Kiev cede more territory as a condition for peace negotiations.
Ukrainian Air Force Gives Green Light for Now
While Ukrainian troops advanced into Russian territory, the situation on the front in eastern Ukraine remained difficult.
There were 154 clashes on Ukrainian territory, the General Staff in Kiev reported in its evening situation report.
According to the General Staff, 71 Russian airstrikes on Ukraine have been recorded, in addition to some 629 kamikaze drones.
However, the Ukrainian air force had given the all-clear for the time being for a feared Russian air attack.
Six strategic Tupolev Tu-95 bombers that took off from northern Russia have landed again, the air force announced on its Telegram channel on Monday.
Ukraine’s official air raid siren app has also removed the alert regarding the plane.
Ukrainians are constantly informing themselves about impending dangers through various channels.
A military-connected blog reported that the plane had simulated launching cruise missiles over the Volga region near Saratov. No missiles were detected in the air.
The Tu-95 bombers were then reported to have landed at Engels Air Force Base on the Volga and at Dyagilevo in the Ryazan region. However, this information could not be independently verified.
Russian fuel storage facility still on fire
Meanwhile, a large fuel storage facility in southern Russia was still burning Monday, the day after a Ukrainian drone strike, Rostov-on-Don regional authorities announced, declaring a state of emergency for the Proletarsk district.
Eighteen firefighters were injured, four of them taken to hospital with burns, Russian state news agency TASS reported.
It was said that high temperatures in the region, above 30 degrees Celsius, were making firefighting difficult.
The fire at the fuel storage facility in Proletarsk, where more than 70 separate tanks are located, was caused by a Ukrainian drone strike on Sunday morning.
In recent months, Ukraine has attacked numerous Russian refineries and other oil facilities with drones, in an effort to disrupt fuel supplies to enemy forces and reduce revenues for Russia’s oil industry.
