Putin Rejects Kyiv Proposal, Reiterates Aim to Seize 4 Ukrainian Regions

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on June 28 that Moscow was not interested in negotiations with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and was intent on completing its war aims and seizing four Ukrainian regions.Zelenskyy published an open letter to Putin on June 4, proposing a face-to-face meeting with Putin and calling for a “full ceasefire for the duration of the negotiations.” The Kremlin ​said at the time it had seen Zelenskyy’s letter and ‌that Putin would be briefed on it, but in his interview with journalist Pavel Zarubin, the Russian leader has made it clear he is not ready for talks.“It is clear why this proposal is being made, because our counter-strikes deep into Ukrainian territory are much stronger, have greater impact, and are, frankly, more destructive,” Putin said.“Given their catastrophic shortage of personnel, the Ukrainian armed forces apparently believe this could be their salvation. But saving the Kyiv regime is not part of our plans.”Putin’s remarks could be seen as a rejection of U.S. President Donald Trump’s June 16 call for Putin to reach a deal with Ukraine.“Russia should make a deal. Russia has lost tremendous amounts of people, and so has Ukraine,” Trump said after a meeting with Zelenskyy and G7 leaders at the group’s summit in France.Trump also said he wanted to focus on Ukraine, because Iran will soon be “back in the rearview mirror.”During his interview, Putin referred to attacks by Ukrainian drones on June 16 and 18 that hit targets across Russia, including the main oil refinery serving Moscow, which is run by state-run company Gazprom Neft. After the second attack, flames and plumes of smoke could be seen rising from the refinery, near the suburb of Kapotnya.Putin said the Ukrainian attacks were “aimed at diverting our attention and forces from achieving the main objectives—the complete liberation of Donbas and Novorossiya.”What Is Novorossiya?The Russian president has previously said that Russia wants to take permanent ownership of four regions, or oblasts, in southern and eastern Ukraine—Luhansk and Donetsk (which together are known as the Donbas) and Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, which he has taken to referring to as “Novorossiya.”The term Novorossiya, or “New Russia,” dates back to the Tsarist period, when it was coined to refer to Crimea and southern Ukraine after Russia seized those areas from the Ottoman Empire.Russia formally annexed all four regions in October 2022, but in late June 2026, it still does not control their whole territory militarily.In June 2024, Putin offered a ceasefire if Ukraine agreed to withdraw its troops from all four regions, something Zelenskyy refused, saying it was a Russian ploy to trick Kyiv into surrendering territory.The Russian leader said during his June 28 interview that he expected Trump’s envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to return to Moscow for more talks once the “hot phase” of the conflict involving Iran was over.Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently said that no formal agreement had been reached during the Alaska summit with Trump in August 2025.President Donald Trump (R) greets Russian President Vladimir Putin as he arrives at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, on August 15, 2025. Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty ImagesDuring a visit to Bahrain on June 25, Rubio said that though there was a “proposal” made in Alaska, there was “no agreement,” adding that “if there had been an agreement, we would have had an end to the war.”Putin seemed to agree with Rubio.“Nobody signed anything, but we talked about certain possibilities for ending the conflict in Ukraine,” Putin said.Putin: More Air Defense Capacity NeededPutin also said Russia needed to do more to boost its air defense capacity to counter the Ukrainian ⁠drone attacks.“The first task is to quickly ⁠and significantly ramp up production of those air defense systems that are most needed,” Putin said. “All the strikes, wherever they hit our infrastructure, absolutely do not affect the situation on the front, on the line of combat contact.”Earlier on June 28, Putin said at a meeting with government ministers in the Kremlin that the drone strikes had ​created fuel shortages in some Russian regions, but Moscow was dealing with them.Zarubin—the journalist who interviewed Putin—has been described by the European Union as a “propagandist” and was sanctioned by the EU in January, along with several other Russian media professionals.Reuters contributed to this report.