The Kremlin on Wednesday dismissed talk by Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy about a plan he has to end the war and said Russia would continue what it calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine.
Mr Zelenskiy said on Tuesday he would present his plan – full details of which he did not publicly disclose – to US president Joe Biden and his two potential successors.
Mr Zelenskiy, addressing a news conference, said Kyiv’s three-week-old incursion into Russia’s Kursk region was part of his plan, but that it also comprised other steps on the economic and diplomatic fronts.
The idea, said Mr Zelenskiy – who is pressing Washington to allow his forces to use long-range US-supplied arms to strike deep inside Russia – was to force Moscow to end the war.
“This is not the first time that we have heard such statements from representatives of the Kyiv regime. We are aware of the nature of this Kyiv regime,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters when asked about Mr Zelenskiy’s plan.
“We are continuing our special military operation and will achieve all of our goals.”
Russia is currently engaged in repelling the Ukrainian incursion that began on August 6th, and is pressing ahead with its own offensive in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.
Mr Peskov also said that Russia supported India’s view on the need for a peaceful settlement, but said it was “more than obvious” that there was no basis for talks right now.
Indian prime minister Narendra Modi said on Tuesday that he had told Russian president Vladimir Putin in a phone call that he backed an early, peaceful resolution to the Ukraine conflict, days after Mr Modi held talks with the Ukrainian leader in Kyiv.
Ukraine-launched drones set several oil tanks on fire at the Glubokinskaya oil depot in Russia’s Rostov oblast, just across the border from Ukraine’s Luhansk oblast.
The Baza channel, which is close to Russia’s security services, said three tanks were burning after strikes by two drones.
Elsewhere, a drone attacked an oil products reservoir in Kotelnich in Russia’s Kirov oblast, more than 1,000km (621 miles) from the Ukrainian border.
Regional governor Alexander Sokolov said there were no casualties or fires from the attack. – Reuters