Russia Calls Ukraine’s Land Swap Proposal ‘Nonsense’
Russian television reported that the Kremlin said on Wednesday that Moscow will not discuss any land swap with Kyiv, in response to a proposal made by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Dmitry Medvedev, Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council, described Kyiv’s idea of exchanging Russian-controlled lands in Ukraine for areas controlled by Moscow in Ukraine as “nonsense,” according to Reuters.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had said that, in the event of negotiations with Moscow, he would propose swapping Ukrainian-held territories in the Russian Kursk region for Ukrainian land currently occupied by Russia.
Zelensky, in an interview with the British newspaper The Guardian published on Tuesday, said: “We will exchange one region for another.”
Medvedev, who served as President of Russia from 2008 to 2012, stated that Moscow has demonstrated its ability to achieve “peace through power,” including through drone and missile strikes targeting Kyiv.
According to open-source battlefield maps, Russia controls about 20% of Ukraine, or more than 112,000 square kilometers, while Ukraine controls around 450 square kilometers of the Kursk region in western Russia.
