Russia criticizes meeting in Saudi Arabia to end war in Ukraine

Russia’s Foreign Ministry on Monday criticized a meeting of international leaders in Saudi Arabia to find a peaceful solution to the war in Ukraine. The Ministry of External Affairs said that the talks were of no importance, as Russia was not invited to it. Senior officials from 40 countries around the world gathered in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia on Sunday for a two-day meeting. The purpose of the meeting was to reach a consensus on key principles to end the 17-month fighting in Ukraine. Russia’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying that without Russia’s participation and taking into account its interests, this meeting has no significance.

In the statement, the Foreign Ministry reiterated its previous assurances that Russia is ready for a diplomatic solution on its own terms. According to the statement, Russia is ready to give its response to serious proposals to end the war. M Podolyak, an adviser to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky, refused to accept Russia’s previous demands, as it would give Russia time to strengthen its position in the Ukrainian territories it has annexed. “The Russian army must completely withdraw from the occupied territories and his country will not compromise on this,” wrote Podolyak on the social media site X, formerly known as Twitter.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s security service announced on Monday the capture of a Russian spy who had been gathering information about President Zelensky’s visit to southern Mykolaiv last month. It claimed that the woman was gathering data to conduct an airstrike during Zelensky’s visit. Zelensky has been a target of the Kremlin since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, when he refused to leave the country even as Russian forces approached Kiev. Russian shelling killed a 57-year-old woman in a village in Ukraine’s Kharkiv province.

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