Putin announced his readiness to discuss bilateral relations with the President of Ukraine in Moscow

Russian President Vladimir Putin said he was ready to receive Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky in Moscow at any convenient time. However, to discuss the situation in the Donbass, the Ukrainian president should first meet with the leadership of the self-proclaimed DPR and LPR, the Russian president believes.

“If we are talking about the development of bilateral relations, then please, we will receive the President of Ukraine in Moscow at any convenient time,” Putin said. According to him, recently the current leadership of Ukraine "has taken a lot of steps that are destroying Russian-Ukrainian relations." “But if President Zelensky wants to start rebuilding these relations, we can only welcome.

If we are talking about discussing the problems of Donbass, then the leadership of Ukraine should meet with the leaders of the DPR and LPR. And only then discuss these problems with representatives of third countries, which in this case is Russia, ”the Russian president said.

On April 20, Zelensky suggested that Putin meet “anywhere in the Ukrainian Donbass where there is a war”: “A fight cannot be inevitable when it is not about a gateway and hooligans, but about a real war and millions of human lives.” Zelensky also said that Russia refused to support a joint statement on the restoration of a complete ceasefire during meetings of the Normandy Four and the Trilateral Contact Group (TCG) on the situation in Donbass. US President Joe Biden also suggested that Putin meet on neutral ground to discuss the range of issues facing the US and Russia.