LAST UPDATE | 5 Jan 2023
RUSSIAN PRESIDENT VLADIMIR Putin told Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan he was open to dialogue with Ukraine if Kyiv accepts territories occupied by Moscow as Russian, the Kremlin said today.
“Putin again confirmed Russia’s openness to serious dialogue on the condition of Kyiv authorities fulfilling the well-known and repeatedly voiced requirements of taking into account the new territorial realities,” the Kremlin said in a statement.
Erdogan had called for peace talks in the phone call with Putin, his office said earlier.
Russian troops occupy large swathes of eastern and southern Ukraine.
The Kremlin claims it has annexed the Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions despite not controlling them in their entirety.
“The Russian side emphasised the destructive role of Western states, pumping the Kyiv regime with weapons and military equipment, providing it with operational information and targets,” the statement added.
The leaders also discussed the implementation of a landmark grain deal, brokered by the UN with the help of Turkey, to unblock Ukrainian grain.
The Kremlin said the pair discussed “the unblocking of food and fertiliser supplies from Russia” and the need for “the removal of all barriers to Russian exports.”
Russia briefly exited the deal in October after a drone attack on its Black Sea Fleet. It re-entered the deal within days but officials have complained of restrictions on Russian products.
Calls for a ceasefire in Ukraine have also come from inside Russia and abroad today.
Erdogan’s “unilateral” ceasefire call followed a proposal earlier in the day by Russia’s spiritual leader Patriarch Kirill for an Orthodox Christmas truce tomorrow.
The 76-year-old Orthodox leader, a staunch supporter of Putin, has given his blessing to Russian troops fighting in Ukraine and delivered heavily anti-Western and anti-Kyiv sermons throughout the conflict.
Kirill appealed to “all parties involved in the internecine conflict with a call to cease fire and establish a Christmas truce from 12:00 on January 6 to 00:00 on January 7 so that Orthodox people can attend services on Christmas Eve and on the day of the Nativity of Christ,” he said on the church’s official website.
The Kremlin’s decision to send troops into Ukraine in February 2022 resulted in many clerics who had continued to remain loyal to Kirill turning away from Moscow.
In May, the Moscow-backed branch of Ukraine’s Orthodox Church severed ties with Russia, citing his lack of condemnation of the fighting.
The deadliest Ukrainian strike on Russian troops reported so far has reignited criticism of Moscow’s mobilisation drive and laid bare a lack of trust in officials almost a year into the offensive.
The Russian army announced 89 soldiers were killed when Kyiv struck a temporary base in the Russian-occupied town of Makiivka with US-supplied rockets just after midnight at New Year’s – while Ukraine put the toll in the hundreds.
Widespread reports of many recently mobilised men being among the dead stirred some anger after months of discontent over the chaotic draft.
There were also rare displays of public grief in Russia, with some frustration towards the army, whose actions in Ukraine are shrouded in secrecy.
Usually, officials would rush to blame the West and Ukraine.
But this time, for many pro-Kremlin commentators, the culprit was closer to home: the army leadership.
Many questioned if 89 was the real death toll, as reports spread on social media that ammunition was stored near to where the soldiers slept.
The army blamed the troops themselves, saying the devastating strike likely came after they used their cell phones despite a ban.
But it also, in a rare move, promised to punish its own officials for mistakes after an investigation.
Thousands of people have been killed in Ukraine and millions forced to flee their homes since President Vladimir Putin ordered troops to attack on 24 February.
Putin has not yet commented on the strike, which came shortly after a New Year address in which he hailed Moscow’s “heroes” fighting in Ukraine.
Following criticism in Russia over the use of US-delivered weaponry by Ukrainian defenders, including in the Makiivka strike, US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Russia was to blame.
There is no “hand-wringing by the administration at all. This is a war. They have been invaded and they (Ukrainians) are striking back and defending themselves,” Kirby said.
“Russian soldiers in their territory are legitimate targets for Ukrainian military action, period.”
Across the Atlantic, French President Emmanuel Macron told Zelenskyy that Paris would increase aid to Ukraine by delivering AMX-10 RC light tanks.
“It is the first time that Western-designed tanks are supplied to the Ukrainian armed forces,” the presidency said after both leaders spoke by telephone. No other details were provided.
Zelenskyy on Twitter said he thanked Macron “for the decision to transfer light tanks” to Ukraine.
In Russia, calls mounted to draw conclusions after the Makiivka tragedy.
The influential head of state television channel RT, Margarita Simonyan, welcomed the army’s promise that officials “will be held accountable”.
“It is time to understand that impunity does not lead to social harmony. Impunity leads to new crimes. And, as a result, to public dissent,” she said.
There have been reports that the servicemen were quartered in an unprotected building that was destroyed because munitions stored on the premises had detonated in the strike.
The small industrial city of Makiivka is located in the Donetsk region, a part of Ukraine that has been under the control of pro-Russian separatists since the beginning of the conflict in the country’s east in 2014.
Denis Pushilin, the Moscow-installed head of Donetsk, hailed the “heroism” of the Russian troops.
“The majority of them, after barely getting out of the building hit by American Himars and regaining consciousness, returned back to pull out their comrades,” Pushilin said on Telegram.
In another Telegram post released late yesterday, he said he had visited the wounded with Viktor Goremykin, Russia’s deputy defence minister, and Dmitry Azarov, governor of the Samara region – where some of the victims hailed from.
Almost all of the injured have been transferred to other regions of Russia for medical attention, Pushilin said.
In comments to local media, Azarov hailed the “courage” of the troops.
“After the shelling, soldiers and officers – wounded and with concussions – saved others, pulling comrades from under the rubble,” he said.
Among the dead were rank-and-file soldiers as well as “representatives of the command staff”, he said.
The Russian-installed head of the occupied part of the southern region of Zaporizhzhia, Yevgeny Balitsky, said five people were killed and another 15 wounded in the town of Vasilyevka.
On the Ukrainian side, the general staff reported Russian shelling in Kramatorsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.
The presidency said five people had been killed and 13 wounded by Russian fire in the past 24 hours.
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