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Russian President Vladimir Putin has suggested that his country’s war on Ukraine may be “coming to an end” and expressed a willingness to meet his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in a third country if a peace deal is finalised.
Putin made the comments to reporters on Saturday, hours after promising victory in Ukraine at Russia’s most scaled-back Victory Day parade in years.
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The remarks came as Russia and Ukraine began a three-day ceasefire and agreed to exchange 1,000 prisoners, in developments that raised cautious hopes of renewed diplomatic progress.
At the parade, Putin praised Russian troops fighting in Ukraine, framing their mission as a “just cause” against “an aggressive force armed and supported by the entire NATO bloc”.
“Victory has always been and will be ours,” he added, as columns of troops lined up on Moscow’s Red Square.
Speaking to reporters afterwards, Putin blamed Western “globalist elites” for the war, saying they had promised NATO would not expand eastward after the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall, but then tried to draw Ukraine into the European Union’s orbit.
He then declared, “I think the matter is coming to an end.”
Russia’s annual Victory Day holiday marks the Soviet Union’s defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II and honours the 27 million Soviet citizens who died in the conflict.
This year’s parade was more subdued than usual, with videos of military hardware shown on giant screens rather than tanks and missile systems rolling through Red Square.
For the first time, Saturday’s parade featured troops from North Korea, a tribute to Pyongyang that sent its soldiers to fight alongside Moscow’s forces to repel a Ukrainian incursion into Russia’s Kursk region.
Russia had declared a unilateral ceasefire for the holiday on Friday and Saturday, while Zelenskyy announced a truce that was supposed to begin on May 6, but neither held, and the parties traded blame for the continuing attacks.
Fears for the festivities eased on Friday, when US President Donald Trump announced that Russia and Ukraine had bowed to his request for a ceasefire running Saturday through Monday and an exchange of prisoners.
“This Ceasefire will include a suspension of all kinetic activity, and also a prison swap of 1,000 prisoners from each Country,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social Post on Friday.
“Talks are continuing” on ending the war, Trump said, adding that “we are getting closer and closer every day”.
“Hopefully, it is the beginning of the end of a very long, deadly, and hard fought War,” he said.
Zelenskyy followed up on Trump’s statement with a decree mockingly permitting Russia to hold its Victory Day celebrations, declaring Red Square temporarily off-limits for Ukrainian strikes.
The Kremlin shrugged off the comments as a “silly joke”.
Zelenskyy has previously proposed to meet with Putin to negotiate a peace deal, but has dismissed the Russian leader’s suggestion that he come to Moscow. On Saturday, Putin told reporters he could meet with Zelenskyy in another country, but only to endorse a comprehensive accord.
“A meeting in a third country is also possible, but only after a peace treaty aimed at a long-term historic perspective is finalised,” Putin said. “This should be a final deal, not the negotiations.”
Putin, who has governed Russia as president or prime minister since the last day of 1999, faces a wave of anxiety in Moscow about the war in Ukraine, which has killed hundreds of thousands of people, left swaths of Ukraine in ruins, and drained Russia’s $3 trillion economy.
Russian troops have been fighting in Ukraine for more than four years. That is longer than Soviet forces fought in World War II, known in Russia as the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45.
But Russian forces have so far been unable to take the whole of the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, where Kyiv’s forces have been pushed back to a line of fortress cities. Russian advances have slowed this year, though Moscow controls just under one-fifth of Ukrainian territory.
European Council President Antonio Costa said last week that there was potential for talks between Europe and Russia on the continent’s future security architecture.
Asked on Saturday if he was willing to engage in talks with the Europeans, Putin said the preferable figure for him was Germany’s former Chancellor Gerhard Schroder.
“For me personally, the former chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, Mr Schroder, is preferable,” Putin said.
