EU: Putin Feigning Interest in Peace   12/03 06:23

   Ukraine and its European allies accused Russian President Vladimir Putin on 
Wednesday of feigning interest in peace efforts after five hours of talks with 
U.S. envoys at the Kremlin produced no breakthrough.

   KYIV, Ukraine (AP) -- Ukraine and its European allies accused Russian 
President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday of feigning interest in peace efforts 
after five hours of talks with U.S. envoys at the Kremlin produced no 
breakthrough.

   The Russian leader "should end the bluster and the bloodshed and be ready to 
come to the table and to support a just and lasting peace," said U.K. Foreign 
Secretary Yvette Cooper. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha urged Putin 
to "stop wasting the world's time."

   The remarks reflect the high tensions and gaping gulf that remain between 
Russia on one side and Ukraine and its European allies on the other over how to 
end a war that Moscow started when it invaded its neighbor nearly four years 
ago.

   A day earlier, Putin accused the Europeans of sabotaging the U.S.-led peace 
efforts -- and warned that, if provoked, Russia would be ready for war with 
Europe.

   Since Moscow invaded Ukraine in 2022, European governments, along with the 
U.S., have spent billions of dollars to support Kyiv financially and 
militarily. Under President Donald Trump, however, the U.S. has tempered its 
support -- and instead made a push to end the war.

   On Wednesday, the Kremlin spokesman said he wouldn't discuss the substance 
of the talks but pushed back on any suggestion that Putin had rejected the U.S. 
peace plan.

   Where the peace talks go from here depends largely on whether the Trump 
administration decides to increase the pressure on Russia or on Ukraine to make 
concessions.

   Unclear where peace talks go now

   A U.S. peace proposal that became public last month was criticized for being 
tilted heavily toward Moscow because it granted some of the Kremlin's core 
demands that Kyiv has rejected as nonstarters.

   Many European leaders worry that if Russia gets what it wants in Ukraine, it 
will have free rein to threaten their countries, which already have faced 
incursions from Russian drones and fighter jets, and an alleged widespread 
sabotage campaign.

   Putin met Tuesday in Moscow with Trump's envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law 
Jared Kushner. The Russian and American sides agreed not to disclose the 
substance of the talks, but at least one major hurdle to a settlement -- the 
fate of four Ukrainian regions Russia partially seized and occupies and claims 
as its own -- remains.

   After the talks, Yuri Ushakov, a senior adviser to Putin, told reporters 
that "so far, a compromise hasn't been found" on the issue of territory, 
without which, he said, the Kremlin sees "no resolution to the crisis."

   Ukraine has ruled out giving up territory that Russia has captured.

   Asked whether peace was closer or further away after these talks, Ushakov 
said: "Not further, that's for sure."

   "But there's still a lot of work to be done, both in Washington and in 
Moscow," he said.

   Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday that it was "not correct" to 
say that Putin had rejected the U.S. peace plan. He declined to comment further 
on the talks.

   "We're deliberately not going to add anything," he said. "It's understood 
that the quieter these negotiations are conducted, the more productive they 
will be."

   Europeans step up assistance for Ukraine

   Foreign ministers from European NATO countries, meeting in Brussels on 
Wednesday, showed little patience with Moscow.

   "What we see is that Putin has not changed any course. He's pushing more 
aggressively on the battlefield," Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna 
said. "It's pretty obvious that he doesn't want to have any kind of peace."

   Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen struck the same note. "So far we 
haven't seen any concessions from the side of the aggressor, which is Russia, 
and I think the best confidence-building measure would be to start with a full 
ceasefire," she told reporters.

   NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said Ukraine's partners will keep sending 
it military aid to ensure pressure is maintained on Moscow.

   "The peace talks are ongoing. That's good," Rutte said.

   "But at the same time, we have to make sure that whilst they take place and 
we are not sure when they will end, that Ukraine is in the strongest possible 
position to keep the fight going, to fight back against the Russians," he said.

   Canada, Germany, Poland and the Netherlands announced that they will spend 
hundreds of millions of dollars more together to buy U.S. weapons to donate to 
Ukraine.

   This year, European countries in NATO and Canada began buying American 
weapons for Ukraine under a financial arrangement known as the Prioritized 
Ukraine Requirements List, or PURL.

   The war claims more lives

   Russia and Ukraine are engaged in a grim war of attrition on the battlefield 
and are using drones and missiles for long-range strikes behind the front line. 
Many analysts have noted that the slow slog favors Russia's larger military, 
especially if disagreements between Europe and the U.S. or among Europeans 
hampers the delivery of weapons to Ukraine.

   Russian drones hit the town of Ternivka in Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region, 
killing two people and injuring three more, the head of the regional military 
administration, Vladyslav Haivanenko, said Wednesday.

   Two people were in critical condition, he said, after the attack destroyed 
one house and damaged six more.

   Overall, Russia fired 111 strike and decoy drones at Ukraine overnight, 
Ukraine's air force said.

   Meanwhile, Russia's Ministry of Defense said Wednesday that air defenses 
destroyed 102 Ukrainian drones overnight.

   Falling drone debris sparked a fire at an oil depot in the Tambov region, 
about 200 kilometers (120 miles) south of Moscow, local Gov. Yegveniy Pervyshov 
said.