Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday that there was no movement in peace talks with Ukraine, and that Kyiv was showing a total unwillingness to continue them.
“Negotiations are not progressing and we note the complete unwillingness of Ukrainian negotiators to continue this process,” Peskov said.
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On Tuesday Interfax news agency cited Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrey Rudenko as saying that Russia and Ukraine were not holding talks “in any form”, and that Kyiv had “practically withdrawn from the negotiation process.”
Peskov also said the Kremlin had no information about a Russian soldier accused of killing an unarmed civilian in Ukraine, the first war crimes trial since Moscow sent troops to Ukraine on February 24.
“We still have no information. And the ability to provide assistance due to the lack of our diplomatic mission there is also very limited,” Peskov said.
He claimed that many such cases reported by Ukraine are “simply fake or staged.”
Vadim Shishimarin, 21, was on Wednesday set to appear at Kyiv’s Solomyansky district court over the death of a 62-year-old man in northeastern Ukraine on February 28.
Charged with war crimes and premeditated murder, the soldier from Irkutsk in Siberia faces a possible life sentence.
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