Putin threatens Ukraine with its disappearance as a state

The tenacious resistance of the Ukrainian Army against the invasion, the numerous casualties that Moscow’s troops are suffering and the international deployment of sanctions against Russia for attacking Ukraine are making the president, Vladimir Putin, lose patience. In separate telephone conversations this Sunday with his French and Turkish counterparts, Emmanuel Macron and Recep Tayyip Erdogan, he stressed once again that he will continue with the offensive until he achieves his objectives: demilitarization and “denazification” of Ukraine in addition to the recognition of Crimea as Russian and of Donbass as an independent enclave. That is total surrender.

However, David Arajamía, one of the members of the Ukrainian delegation in the negotiations with Russia for a ceasefire and the end of hostilities, asserted that “the only issues on which there is practically no possibility of agreement with Moscow are Crimea and the status of the self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Lugansk» (Donbass). In relation to NATO, Kiev is ready to give up its membership in the Alliance.

In an appearance before the cameras of the Russian channel Rossiya-24, Putin warned that “if Ukraine continues with the same spirit shown up to now, it will call into question the future of its statehood.” “Their leaders must understand this, since the responsibility for the future of their country will fall on them,” he warned. It is not the first time that Putin has threatened Kiev with the total destruction of its statehood, something that, according to him, “had never had before” and obtained thanks to the communist regime and the disintegration of the former Soviet Union (USSR).

new flop

Meanwhile, this Sunday a second attempt to evacuate civilians from the port city of Mariupol, on the Sea of ​​Azov, failed again. The first attempt was unsuccessful on Saturday. The Russian side again accused the Ukrainian troops of holding the population and preventing their departure, while Kiev maintains that the Russian forces and the Donbass rebels are the ones preventing the creation of the corridor because they do not respect the ceasefire, essential to ensure the safety of evacuees.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) confirmed that the population could not leave Mariúpol and called for a “detailed and functional” agreement between the parties to the conflict that would make the evacuation possible. It has been a week since Russian troops announced that they had brought Mariupol under their control, but in reality they have only managed to besiege it. Its fall would mean almost total control of the entire Donetsk province for the separatist militias and the creation of a strip to connect Donbass with Crimea.

On the other hand, while the United States and the United Kingdom finalize a plan to send combat aircraft to Ukraine, the Russian Defense Ministry warned on Sunday that it could take action against governments that deploy the devices. “Virtually all combat-capable aviation of the Kiev regime was destroyed. But we know from a reliable source that some Ukrainian aircraft flew to Romania and other neighboring countries,” Defense spokesman Igor Konashenkov said.

In his words, “the use of airfield networks of these countries as a base for Ukrainian military aircraft and their subsequent use against the Russian armed forces could be considered as an implication of these countries in the armed conflict.” Putin made the same point on Saturday about plans to create a no-fly zone over the Ukrainian sky. He said that the countries involved in such a device will also be considered participants in the conflict. In this sense, the head of the European Commission, Charles Mitchel, guaranteed that the EU will not use its funds to send planes to Kiev.

fighting in the south

For his part, the Ukrainian president, Volodímir Zelenski, denounced this Sunday that the Russian Army is preparing to bomb Odessa, on the shores of the Black Sea, the most important port city in Ukraine. He warned that “it will be a historic crime.” According to Zelensky, Russian aircraft also fired missiles at the Vinnytsia airport, in the central part of the country, leaving it completely destroyed.

Fighting also spread to Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine and continued in Chernigov in the north of the country and Kharkiv in the east. Meanwhile, the Russian Army tightened the fence around Kiev, the capital. In fact, in its outskirts, in Bucha and Irpin, the fighting intensified. The Ukrainian Presidency once again insisted on the need for Zelensky and Putin to meet to put an end to the clashes.