On Friday, the Kremlin said that despite the withdrawal of its troops from the west bank of the Dnieper and the abandonment of the city of Kherson, the region of the same name still belongs to Russia, Reuters reported.
Kremlin spokesman Dmytro Peskov told reporters during the daily press conference on Friday that the status of the region is “fixed” and no changes are possible.
“This is a subject of the Russian Federation. It is legally established and defined. There are no changes and there cannot be,” he said.
Peskov also said that the Kremlin does not regret the announcement of the annexation of Kherson Oblast and the other three Ukrainian regions where its armed forces occupied the territories during the triumphal ceremony organized in Moscow on September 30.
Asked by journalists to comment on the decision to withdraw Russian troops to the eastern bank of the Peskov river, he replied that it had been adopted by the Ministry of Defense and he had “nothing to add”.
The Kremlin says the war will continue until it achieves its goals
But a spokesman for President Vladimir Putin said Russia remains committed to achieving its goals in Ukraine.
According to him, the war can end “only after the achievement of these goals or through peace negotiations that achieve the fulfillment of these goals.”
“But peace talks are impossible because of the position of the Ukrainian side,” Dmytro Peskov told reporters in Moscow.
On October 4, a few days after Moscow announced the annexation of Ukrainian territories, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi signed a decree officially banning any talks with Vladimir Putin, but leaving the door open for talks with Russia.
“He (Putin) does not know what dignity and honesty are. Therefore, we are ready to hold a dialogue with Russia, but with another Russian president,” Zelenskyi said at the meeting of the Security Council of Ukraine, which he convened a day ago.
On Friday, shortly after the collapse of the Antoniv bridge across the Dnipro, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced that it had completed the withdrawal of Russian troops to the other shore.
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