Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky announced this Friday that Ukraine was going to sign an accelerated application for NATO membership and that it will not negotiate with Russia while Vladimir Putin is in power, statements that come minutes after the Kremlin formally indicate that the annexation of four Ukrainian regions.
“We took a decisive step by signing Ukraine’s candidacy with a view to an accelerated accession to NATO”, Zelensky said in a video broadcast on social networks.
The president emphasized that despite Russia’s request for the “cessation” of hostilities, he will not negotiate with his counterpart.
“Ukraine will not negotiate with Russia as long as Putin is the President of the Russian Federation. We will negotiate with the new president”, added Zelensky.
After the announcement of the annexation Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhia Putin called on Ukraine to end the war and return to the negotiating table. However, he warned that the option “made” by the four regions to join Russia is “definitive”.
“The inhabitants of Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhia become our citizens forever ”, Putin said this Friday. “The people voted for our common future”.
“We call on the kyiv regime to immediately cease fire, put an end to military actions, to the war that the 2014 and return to the negotiating table“said the Kremlin leader in a speech prior to the signing of the controversial annexation treaties.
Putin added that the collapse of Western “hegemony” has already begun and there is no going back, but he insisted that Russia does not aspire to “restore” the Soviet Union, despite the annexation confirmed after the referendums sponsored by the Russian regime.
“The USSR disappeared, the past cannot be brought back. And Russia has no need for that today; we do not aspire to that“Putin sentenced.
With information from DW