Kremlin reveals key demand before Ukraine peace talks

No negotiations with Kiev can take place unless Ukrainian troops first withdraw from Russian territory and renounce NATO membership, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said.

President Vladimir Putin’s press secretary was commenting on speculation by the British outlet Financial Times about some kind of peace talks, calling the story fake news.

“The basic conditions [for talks] were in the president’s peace initiative,” Peskov told reporters on Wednesday, referring to the terms Putin outlined earlier this year.

One of these conditions is the removal of all Ukrainian troops from Russian territory, including the new regions, Peskov said. This means not just the incursion into Kursk Region, but the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, as well as Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions in their full administrative boundaries.

Citing anonymous sources, FT has claimed that Moscow and Kiev are “in preliminary discussions” to resume peace talks. According to the outlet, Ukraine is interested in restarting the Qatar-mediated negotiations “that came close to an agreement in August before being derailed by Ukraine’s invasion of Kursk.”

The outlet also claimed that the Ukrainian and Russian intelligence services have reached a mutual understanding to stop targeting each other’s energy infrastructure, calling it “the most significant de-escalation” of the conflict to date.

Peskov responded by saying that “nowadays there are a lot of bogus stories that have nothing to do with reality,” adding that “even the most respectable publications do not shy away from planting this misleading information.”

Russia received a Turkish request to discuss energy infrastructure strikes last month, according to former Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu, who now serves as the secretary of the Security Council. According to Shoigu, Russia was willing to consider a potential deal, but the Ukrainian side rejected it.

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