Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said he would seek US backing this week for a “victory plan” that would force Russia to negotiate a fair end to the war even as Moscow dismissed a second “peace summit” proposed by Kyiv for later this year.
Mr Zelenskiy was expected to arrive in the US on Sunday and visit an ammunition factory in Pennsylvania that has supplied vital artillery shells to his country’s forces in advance of meetings through the week with President Joe Biden and other top US officials.
Before leaving Ukraine Mr Zelenskiy said his forces urgently needed US permission to fire western-supplied missiles at military targets deeper inside Russia to degrade enemy supply lines and disrupt devastating air strikes on Ukrainian cities and critical infrastructure.
“We are convincing our partners – and we will continue to talk about this next week – that Ukraine needs full long-range capabilities. And not only our own drones, not only our own missiles, which still do not have enough range, but also everything that can protect the world from terror, from Russia,” Mr Zelenskiy said, as Ukraine’s drone forces continued to strike large ammunition depots hundreds of kilometres inside Russia.
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“The next week can be decisive in many ways...For this to happen the determination of our partners must match the courage of Ukrainians,” he said.
“The answer to the question of when this war will end lies in the question of when our partners’ determination will keep pace with what we can do for our defence, for our independence, for our victory...Our clear strategy will be on the table for our partners. For the president of the United States.”
The White House has rebuffed Ukraine’s requests for clearance to strike deeper inside Russia, citing fears of “escalation” in Europe’s biggest war since 1945. Other allies of Ukraine, including Britain, are believed to be more open to deeper strikes using missiles that they have provided to Kyiv, but want to move in co-ordination with Washington in the face of repeated Russian threats of retaliation.
“Neither America nor the United Kingdom gave us permission to use these weapons on the territory of Russia, on any targets, at any distance,” Mr Zelenskiy said, noting that Mr Biden’s position on arms supplies had shifted at times during the war. “We have had some decisions in the history of our relationship with Biden – very interesting and difficult dialogues...He later changed his point of view,” he said.
Ukraine says it hopes to organise a second “peace summit” this year to discuss how to end the war, and it wants Russia to attend, having not invited Moscow to the first such summit in Switzerland in June.
Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Moscow’s representatives “are not going to participate in any” talks on a 10-point “peace formula” proposed by Kyiv to end Russia’s occupation of all Ukrainian territory and hold it responsible for war crimes and for paying reparations. “This process has nothing to do with a settlement. It is yet another show of fraud by the Anglo-Saxons and their Ukrainian puppets,” she added.
Kyiv’s forces are believed to have destroyed many thousands of tonnes of Russian ammunition, including air defence and ballistic missiles, in at least three strikes on large arms depots hundreds of kilometres from the Ukrainian border in recent days; Mr Zelenskiy said domestically-produced weapons had been used in the strikes.
Ukraine said it shot down 71 of 80 attack drones fired by Russia on Sunday, a day after 21 civilians were injured when Russian bombs hit an apartment block in Ukraine’s second city Kharkiv.
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