Ukrainian President Volodymiazelensky on Saturday accused Russian President Vladimir V. Putin of trying to improve a ceasefire meeting with Washington by surrounding Kiev's troops in Russia's Kursk region, but said Ukrainian forces were not trapped.
Meanwhile, the Russian Ministry of Defense said it had recaptured two villages outside Skascha, the main Russian town that Ukraine had occupied in the Kursk region. Ukrainian general staff have not publicly commented on the capture of Suda in Russia. However, on Saturday morning it released a map of the battlefield showing towns outside the Ukrainian-controlled territory of the Kursk region.
The battle is furious in parts of and around the Kursk region, which Ukraine seized in a shocking attack last summer in an assault on Russian territory. The Kremlin is pushing for an attack that moves forward to reclaim the land there, extending negotiations on the ceasefire proposed by Washington and Kiev this week.
On Friday, Putin said he would save their lives if they surrendered, asking Ukrainian forces to still fight in the Kursk region, to abandon their arms. He also said that Ukrainian troops were surrounded by it. He said this was a claim that President Trump repeated in his message about the true society.
Speaking to a Kiev journalist, Zelensky called the claim untrue.
“There is a Ukrainian army in the Kursk region,” he said. “Their siege is a lie from Putin.”
But Russian troops are trying to cut off and lock up Ukrainian troops in the Kursk region by pushing them into nearby Smie areas in Ukraine, Zelensky added that Kiev is countering the threat.
He said the actions of the Russian army demonstrated that Moscow was not interested in peace.
Ukrainian officials said the increased ability to attack roads from Sadha to Ukraine puts withdrawal from the Kursk region at risk for Ukrainian forces. However, they noted that the troops were not completely surrounded.
It was not clear how many Ukrainian troops remain in the Kursk region as of Saturday, but many of them have withdrawn in recent weeks.
Moscow has been raging for months due to the occupation of parts of the Kursk region of Ukraine. This was the first time that Russian land was seized by foreign forces since World War II. At one point last year, Russian officials said negotiations with Ukraine were out of question while Kiev's troops still occupying the land.
Putin previously rejected the idea of a truce or ceasefire, and presented a temporary suspension in the battle as battlefield interests to Ukraine's troops, but when President Trump's administration brokered a 30-day ceasefire with Ukrainian officials and proposed it to Putin this week, the Russian leader refused to refuse.
“The idea itself is correct and I definitely support it, but there are questions that need to be discussed,” Putin said, pursuing the purpose of his battlefield, as he continued his quick reconciliation with Moscow's Washington.
The Russian leaders then laid out conditions for a ceasefire known to Kiev to be unacceptable, including a demand for Ukraine to mobilize new soldiers, train the army, and halt the import of weapons during periods of suspension of combat.
Trump said in his Truth Social Post on Friday that his administration had a “very good productive discussion” with Putin.
The two leaders are expected to talk by phone after Trump's envoy, Steve Witkov, visits Moscow, meets with Putin and discusses proposals for a ceasefire this week.
In the meantime, Russia has escalated on the battlefield.
Russia has momentum along the Ukrainian border between the Kursk and Smie regions ahead of what Ukrainian officials expect to be a major offensive effort to cut off Kresk's Ukrainian troops across the border.
Recently, Russia has conducted reconnaissance, tested Ukraine's defenses and sent small attacks and sabotage groups to try to set the stage for a bigger push, Ukrainian officials said. Zelensky's comments highlighted the threat.
Moscow has stepped up its efforts to seize Kursk last week as Ukraine was caught up in a temporary cutoff of US military aid and intelligence news support. As Ukrainians retreat to a more defensive position, Russians are being pushed from multiple directions, Ukrainian officials and analysts said.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitri S. Peskov reiterated Putin's offer to Ukrainian soldiers to save and save lives in comments to the state communications agency on Saturday.
“It still works,” Peskov said, but he added that “time was running out.”
The mere mention of the siege is nerve-wracking for many Ukrainians. Efforts to save the lives of surrounded Ukrainian soldiers played an important role in negotiations with Russia in 2014 in Ilovais and in 2015 in Debarto Save.
Both are remembered as burning experiences in Ukraine, and concessions are offered in Ukrainian views by offering only the Russian re-class and open fires of fire.
In 2015, Russian troops attacked thousands of Ukrainian soldiers in unstable positions in the town of Debaltseve, where there is a single access road for retreats and supplies. Cerez-fire negotiations led to an agreement known as Minsk 2 – failed previous efforts to resolve the battle in eastern Ukraine – began when this road was under a direct fire from Russian tanks but not physically controlled by Russian soldiers.
This situation blurred whether the town was surrounded or not. In negotiations, Putin argued that the situation was comparable to that surrounding the military.
Ukraine gave political concessions to the Minsk 2 agreement to save the surrounding soldiers. Russia later took the position that a ceasefire was applied to the frontlines, but not to soldiers already under siege. An accidental Ukraine dispatch retreated under fire in a dash before dawn a few days later, killing more than 100 soldiers.
The fight occurs amid an increase in diplomatic activities aimed at dealing with conflict.
British Prime Minister Kiel warned on Saturday that Putin could not be allowed to “match President Trump's deal” as he convened a virtual summit of global leaders who had pledged to support Ukraine.
“The Kremlin's complete disregard for President Trump's proposal to ceasefire only demonstrates that Putin is not serious about peace,” the British leader said.
Even with attention being focused on the Kursk area, the attack continued elsewhere in front of the area.
Overnight, Russia fired two Iskander M ballistic missiles and 178 drones in the Ukrainian city, according to Ukrainian authorities. Local authorities say the missiles attacked a residential area in central Ukraine, home to Zelensky's Klaivi Li, home to Zelensky's hometown, central Ukraine.
Reported by Andrew E. Kramer, Constant Méheut and Marc Santora of Kyiv.
