RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE
Zelensky dismisses Pope’s peacemaking efforts
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has rejected Pope Francis’ offer to help negotiate an end to the conflict in his country. Zelensky previously banned all contact between his government and Moscow, and has since rejected all offers of foreign mediation.
“With all due respect to His Holiness, we don’t need mediators, we need a just peace,” Zelensky told Italian talk show host Bruno Vespa on Saturday, after a meeting with the pontiff in the Vatican.
"It was an honor for me to meet His Holiness, but he knows my position: the war is in Ukraine and the [peace] plan must be Ukrainian,” Zelensky continued. “You can’t mediate with [Russian President Vladimir] Putin.”
While the Vatican has called on Russia to unilaterally cease its military operation in Ukraine, Pope Francis has offered on multiple occasions to help Kiev and Moscow reach a “consensual” end to the conflict, while praising mediation efforts by Türkiye last year.
The Turkish-brokered talks collapsed last April when the Ukrainian delegation pulled out after a surprise visit to Kiev by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who urged Zelensky to keep fighting. Officials in Moscow and Ankara have both stated that the US and its allies didn’t want Ukraine to sign any peace deal with Russia.
Zelensky has since issued a decree banning any contact between his officials and the Kremlin, while Kiev, Washington, and Brussels have all rejected a broad peace plan published by China earlier this year.
With the US and EU pledging to supply him with weapons for “as long as it takes,”Zelensky insists that the only peace plan Ukraine will abide by is its own – a ten-point document demanding that Russia pay reparations, surrender its officials to face war crimes tribunals, and forfeit all of its territory claimed by Kiev, including Crimea.
Russia understands that any peace talks will not be held “with Zelensky, who is a puppet in the hands of the West, but directly with his masters,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said earlier this month.
** Ukraine lying about taking down hypersonic missile – Izvestia
Kiev’s claims that it intercepted a Russian hypersonic Kinzhal missile with a US-made Patriot air defense system are not true, several sources within the Russian military and defense industry told the newspaper Izvestia on Saturday. Ukrainian forces have failed to hit a single such missile to date, the sources added.
Most Kinzhal launches are not even detected by either Ukrainian or NATO radar surveillance systems, the Russian media outlet claimed, citing the same anonymous sources.
Izvestia also reported that the remnants of what was claimed to be a Kinzhal displayed by Kiev on May 10 might have belonged to another Russian missile – the 9M723 – launched by the ground-based short-range ballistic missile system Iskander-M. Some elements of the two missiles’ construction are similar, although the Iskander-M has been used much more frequently by Russian forces during the ongoing campaign in Ukraine, a military expert told reporters.
Kiev showed on May 10 the remnants of what it said were several missiles, one of which it claimed was a Kinzhal. However, Izvestia’s sources said that, judging by the looks of what was displayed, all of the missiles had fulfilled their aims rather than being intercepted.
On Thursday, another source within the Russian military also called the reports about an interception of the Russian Kinzhal missile by the Patriot system “an attempt to substitute a wish for reality.” The hypersonic missile has a speed exceeding the maximum interception capabilities of any air-defense systems used by Ukraine, including the Patriot, the source told TASS. The Kinzhal also executes a special maneuver to avoid interception and makes an almost vertical approach to the target, the source added.
Kiev reportedly inflates the number of Russian missiles its forces intercept to justify such heavy use of ammunition for the air-defense systems supplied by the West. “The number of interceptions is two-three times higher than the number [of missiles] we really launch,” the source said, adding that sometimes Kiev reports intercepting missiles that Russia did not even launch.
Last week, Ukraine’s Air Force commander, Lieutenant General Nikolay Oleshuk, claimed on his Telegram channel that Kiev's forces had intercepted a hypersonic Kinzhal missile. On May 9, the Pentagon press secretary, Brigadier General Patrick Ryder, told journalists that the US Defense Department “can confirm that the Ukrainians took down this Russian missile with a Patriot missile defense system.”He said, though, that he would not “get into the specifics” or try to “characterize”the missile supposedly intercepted by Kiev.
WESTERN PERSPECTIVE
Ukraine says its troops are advancing in two directions in Bakhmut suburbs
Ukrainian troops are advancing in two directions in the eastern city of Bakhmut but the situation in the city centre is more complicated, deputy defence minister Hanna Malyar said on Saturday.
Ukrainian and Russian officials both say pro-Kyiv forces have started to push back in and around Bakhmut after blunting a months-long offensive by troops loyal to Moscow that left much of the city in ruins.
Russia acknowledged on Friday that its forces had fallen back north of Bakhmut ahead of a long-promised counter offensive by Ukraine to retake more territory it lost after the start of the war last year.
"Our troops are gradually advancing in two directions in the suburbs of Bakhmut ... however, the situation in the city itself is more complicated," Malyar wrote on Telegram.
"Thanks to the competent planning of the command and the courage of our fighters, the enemy is not able to take the city under its control."
Much of the fighting in Bakhmut is being led by the Wagner group of mercenaries. In a Telegram post, founder Yevgeny Prigozhin said his men had advanced up to 550 metres (1,800 feet) in some directions on Saturday and said Ukrainian forces controlled less than 1.78 sq km (0.7 sq miles) of the centre.
Prigozhin is embroiled in a public relations war with the defence ministry in Moscow over what he says is its refusal to provide enough ammunition.
A Wagner employee tried to deliver a personal letter from Prigozhin to Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu on Saturday, but did not succeed, the Wagner press service said in a separate Telegram post. The letter dealt with what Prigozhin says is the poor performance by regular troops on Wagner's flanks.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in Rome for an official visit, did not respond directly when asked when the counter offensive would start.
"I can't answer this question but you will see the results and Russia will feel them," he told Italian television.
** Ukraine's Zelenskiy lands in Germany in bid to shore up support
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has landed in Berlin, according to a post on his Twitter feed, as the leader seeks to shore up support from key allies against Russia's invasion.
"Already in Berlin," Zelenskiy tweeted shortly after midnight on Sunday, arriving from Italy where he met with Italian officials and Pope Francis on Saturday.
The Ukrainian leader last visited Germany for the Munich Security Council in February last year just before the war broke out.
Germany, which is Europe's largest economy, faced criticism at the start of the war for what some called a hesitant response, but it has become one of Ukraine's biggest providers of financial and military assistance, ahead of other European powers like France.
Germany on Saturday announced 2.7 billion euro ($3.0 billion) of military aid to Ukraine, its biggest such package since the Russian invasion, and pledged further support for Kyiv for as long as necessary.
The country has also taken in around a million Ukrainian refugees.
Zelenskiy will likely want to know directly from Chancellor Olaf Scholz how he sees the war ending, said Christian Moelling, deputy director at the German Council on Foreign Relations.
"Does Germany want a Ukrainian victory or is it enough for the war to end?" he said. "It will be important for Zelenskiy to hear directly from the chancellor how he thinks."
Ukraine is also likely aware of the need to shore up support from the allies supporting it financially as they deal with a cost of living crisis at home, said Moelling.
"Ukraine needs financial assistance to pay its debt so it doesn't go bankrupt and Germany plays a big role there," he said. "And Ukraine is seeing that in Germany other topics are beginning to move into the foreground."
An Ipsos survey in January showed the share of Germans who believed the country could not afford to lend financial support to Ukraine due to the current economic crisis had risen 9 percentage points to 56%.
That survey also showed a drop in German support for accepting new refugees from Ukraine and providing military assistance.
RT/Reuters