Ukraine’s neutrality essential for achieving peace, Putin says 

Russian President Vladimir Putin has voiced the necessity that Ukraine remain neutral in order to restore peace between the two neighboring countries.

"If there is no neutrality, it is difficult to imagine the existence of any good-neighborly relations between Russia and Ukraine," Putin said on Thursday at Valdai International Discussion Club in Sochi.

If Ukraine is not neutral, it will be "constantly used as a tool in the wrong hands and to the detriment of the interests of the Russian Federation," he said of Ukraine's push to join the US-led NATO.

Putin said, "We are determined to create conditions for a long-term settlement so that Ukraine is an independent, sovereign state, and not an instrument in the hands of third countries, and not used in their interests."

The Russian leader said the people who live in the ex-Soviet republic should be allowed to determine the future of the region once the current war is ended.

"The borders of Ukraine should be in accordance with the sovereign decisions of people who live in certain territories and which we call our historical territories,” he said.

NATO pledges $43 billion in assistance to Ukraine, guarantees ‘irreversible path’ to membership

NATO has pledged $43 billion in assistance to Ukraine and guaranteed an ‘irreversible path’ to membership once the war with Russia is over.

Putin said Ukraine would have to drop its NATO ambitions to prevent the Western military alliance from encroaching on Russia's western borders.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky says the conditions set by Russia for a long-term settlement of the conflict are tantamount to Kiev's surrendering to Moscow.

Instead, he has presented his "victory plan" for which he has requested more arms and ammunition from his Western backers.

US President-elect Donald Trump has criticized Zelensky over what he deems as the waste of huge shipments of weaponry already supplied to Ukraine since the start of the war in Feb 2022 and vowed to end the war.

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