Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday declared a three-day ceasefire in May in the war with Ukraine to mark the 80th anniversary of the victory of the Soviet Union and its allies in World War Two.
Putin’s move appeared aimed at signalling that Russia is still interested in peace – something that Ukraine and its European allies dispute – as President Donald Trump’s administration in Washington grows impatient with stuttering efforts toward peace.
The Kremlin said the 72-hour ceasefire would run on May 8, May 9 – when Putin will host international leaders including Chinese President Xi Jinping for lavish celebrations to commemorate victory over Nazi Germany – and May 10.
Kyiv questioned why Putin would not agree to its call for an immediate ceasefire lasting at least 30 days to pave the way for diplomacy.
“For some reason, everyone is supposed to wait for May 8 and only then have a ceasefire to ensure calm for Putin during the parade,” President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address. “We value people’s lives and not parades.”
Russia has said it wants a full settlement, not a pause.
Putin’s announcement came after U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke on Sunday. The White House said Trump wanted a permanent ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.
“While President Trump welcomes Vladimir Putin’s willingness to pause the conflict, the president has been very clear he wants a permanent ceasefire and to bring this conflict to a peaceful resolution,” said National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes.
“All military actions are suspended for this period. Russia believes that the Ukrainian side should follow this example,” the Kremlin said in a statement on the May 8-10 ceasefire.
“In the event of violations by the Ukrainian side, Russia’s armed forces will give an adequate and effective response.”
It was the second unilateral truce announcement that Putin has made in quick succession, following a 30-hour Easter ceasefire that each side accused the other of violating countless times.
It came after Trump criticised Putin for a deadly Russian attack on Kyiv last week and voiced concern at the weekend that Putin was “just tapping me along”. Washington has repeatedly threatened to abandon its peace efforts unless there is real progress.
TALKS ‘WITHOUT PRECONDITIONS’
Rubio in a call with Lavrov on Sunday “underscored to his Russian counterpart the next steps in Russia-Ukraine peace talks and the need to end the war now,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a statement on Monday, without offering more details.
Russia’s foreign ministry said Lavrov “highlighted the importance of reinforcing the emerging conditions necessary to launch negotiations aimed at establishing a reliable framework for long-term, sustainable peace.”
The Kremlin said Moscow wants direct talks with Ukraine “without preconditions.”
Lavrov, in a written interview with Brazil’s O Globo newspaper on Monday, said that as well as ruling out Ukraine’s membership of NATO, a settlement should include “demilitarizing and de-Nazifying Ukraine” and international recognition of four regions of Ukraine that Russia has partially occupied since 2022 and claimed as its own.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday that the signal for direct talks should come from Ukraine, as it currently had a “legal ban” on negotiating with Putin.
He was referring to a 2022 decree in which Zelenskiy ruled out such negotiations, after Russia had claimed four Ukrainian regions as its own in an action condemned as illegal by most countries at the United Nations.
Ukraine accuses Russia of playing for time in order to try to seize more of its territory, and has urged greater international pressure to get Moscow to stop fighting.
Russia accuses Ukraine of being unwilling to make any concessions and of seeking a ceasefire only on its own terms.
Trump on Sunday urged Russia to stop its attacks in Ukraine and suggested Zelenskiy was ready to give up Crimea, which Russia seized from it in 2014.
Zelenskiy said earlier this month that doing so would violate Ukraine’s constitution. Kyiv has not commented on Trump’s comments on Sunday regarding Crimea.
(Reporting by Reporters , Yuliia Dysa , Simon Lewis, and Ron Popeski and Oleksandr Kozhukha;)
