Europeans should join peace talks in Ukraine, not hinder, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in an interview with the Indian newspaper "India Today" on the eve of his visit to India and published today, BTA reports.
"We will establish control over Donbas and Novorossia (ed. note - the southern part of Ukraine, including Odessa, Kherson and Dnipropetrovsk regions), whether by military or other means", he points out.
Moscow has offered Kiev to withdraw its troops from Donbas (the region includes parts of Donetsk and Luhansk regions) and then there would be no military conflict, but Ukraine prefers to fight, the Russian president notes in the interview.
"We told the Ukrainians: People do not want to live with you, they went to a referendum, voted for independence - withdraw your troops and there will be no military action. No, they prefer to fight. "Well, now they've joined forces," reads an excerpt from the interview, quoted by TASS.
Putin added that his meeting with US special envoy Steve Witkoff and President Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner was "very useful," Reuters reported.
"Our talks were based on the proposals discussed with President Trump in Alaska," the Russian head of state told India Today, referring to the meeting on August 15 in the US city of Anchorage.