Visit our website:
http://www.france24.com
Like us on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English
Follow us on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/France24_en
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00for more on this situation. Doug, I'm wondering, what is going through Vladimir Putin's mind
00:05right now? He's playing the clock. They're calling it
00:08strategic silence. He is not going to allow the Americans to set the terms and the Americans
00:15to dictate the timing. Vladimir Putin, when and if he signs on to the ceasefire, is going
00:21to do it on his terms, according to his conditions. And let's be clear about it. His conditions
00:26have not changed. Yes, the Americans are saying at this hour that they're expecting Russia
00:30to accept it unconditionally. That was what the Secretary of State said. And we've been
00:35saying it's become cliched, putting the ball in Russia's court.
00:39The fact of the matter is, unconditionally, that's where you're going to have a red line
00:43here with Putin. He has not changed his narrative. He has not changed his conditions. Putin has
00:49not budged on where he stands with respect to any potential ceasefire, if you will, let
00:54alone peace plan. He continues to consider Ukraine a country that needs to be denazified
00:59in the Russian propaganda term that has been consistently used throughout this war. It
01:04needs to be demilitarized. That means eviscerated of any sense of a standing army that could
01:09protect it as a sovereign country. Which brings me to the next point. It cannot
01:13essentially be an independent and sovereign country. The Kremlin might not explicitly
01:18say it in those terms. That's exactly what the condition is. Ukraine, if it is going
01:24to continue to exist in any way, it has to exist as an emasculated entity, clearly under
01:31Russia's thumb, clearly within Russia's sphere of influence, its backyard. And once again,
01:38perhaps not explicit, but implicit, is that a Ukraine without Volodymyr Zelensky, a man
01:43that the Russian regime considers an illegitimate president because Ukraine hasn't held elections
01:49in the midst of a war. These are all conditions, all red lines. And I will just add that he's
01:54not going to sign on to a ceasefire as long as they are making advances on the battlefield,
01:59most notably today in the Kursk region of Russia, where the latest reports are that
02:03Russians continue to recapture villages. It's not in their interest to right now to play
02:08according to Trump's clock. Is there a sense that the U.S. and Ukraine
02:12are backing Putin into a corner on this issue? Because if he chooses to continue fighting,
02:18he is de facto the bad guy, as in fact he is all along, because he's the man who started
02:23the invasion. So let's get that clear. Of course, if he doesn't, how does he sell it
02:28to the Russian public that he hasn't captured Ukraine, that he hasn't captured Volodymyr
02:32Zelensky, that his invasion launched in 2022 didn't turn out to be the three-day wonder
02:37that he said it would be? You are hitting the nail on the head here,
02:40Mark. He is between literally a Trump in a hard place. Excuse the very bad pun. But
02:46no, more seriously, yes, he cannot afford to, and he's not in the best position in the
02:52world, he knows it. He cannot afford to, and he doesn't want to completely alienate Trump,
02:57his new buddy, a man who, I mean, he hit the lottery with Donald Trump, basically. All
03:01of a sudden, the U.S. completely flip-flopping, about-facing on its foreign policy, realigning
03:08in Russia's favor. I mean, who could have hoped for that in Russia? But like you said
03:11at the same time, under a lot of pressure, a lot of pressure, especially from the ultranationalist
03:17wing, the state-run media, you know, sort of oversees these propagandistic pro-war military
03:22bloggers. They're not all officially state correspondents. They do have divergent views
03:27sometimes, but they all generally see this ceasefire deal as a no-go. They say, why the
03:32hell should Russia sign anything of the sort? He has to be cognizant of this camp. Could
03:37I, could I just show our viewers actually a couple of these comments we've heard from
03:41this sort of crew here? What I say, they're not all bloggers. Some of them are also correspondents.
03:46Do we have, yeah, the first one here is from a man named Alexander Kotz. Now I call, that's
03:51my word. I use propagandist because that's essentially what he is. He works for Komsomolskaya
03:56Pravda, state-run media, almost everything now in Russia is state-run media, weekly newspaper.
04:01Look what he said, shove your peace initiatives up your A star star. Last year, you were given
04:07the conditions for a ceasefire. You responded with an invasion. We got the message. Who
04:11is he channeling there? He's talking directly to Ukraine, meaning, and what is he referring
04:15to? He's referring to Ukraine's invasion of Kursk in Russia, right? Last August at the
04:20time, an invasion that was seen now as a bargaining chip potentially for Ukraine when we came
04:25to this point in time, also in the hope that Russian forces would be siphoned away from
04:29the front in Eastern and Southern Ukraine to have to go fight against these Ukrainian
04:33troops on Russian soil in Kursk. That didn't really happen the way it was planned perhaps
04:38because a lot of North Koreans were enlisted by Russia to go fight there. Um, but that
04:41shows one sentiment. I want to show you one other, and this is from a real blogger. The
04:45Russian, uh, telegram is what is absolutely all the rage in Russia. Everyone follows it.
04:50Uh, there are a lot of bloggers on there. This is one pro-war Russian blogger on telegram.
04:54It's called the Z, one of the Zed channels, Zed for, for the war, pro-war. What will a
04:58ceasefire give Russia? Nothing. What will 30 days give the Ukrainians? That's the, uh,
05:03the ceasefire duration as proposed. Frontline stabilization, especially near Pokrovsk in
05:07the Donetsk region and in the Kursk region. And this is the line that is consistently
05:12put forward, uh, Mark on these pro-war military blogs. Why should we give up now? This would
05:17only give those 30 days the Ukrainians time to strengthen their forces and to prepare
05:22new attacks. We would be idiots right now. Uh, Putin don't even think of signing that
05:27ceasefire. We are winning right now. Let's hold up. So this is not just strategic silence.
05:32They see it as militarily, uh, the right thing to do right now. He's under a lot of
05:36pressure, but like I said, he can't afford to totally alienate Trump. There's the one
05:40last option who's stopping Putin from signing that ceasefire. And then whenever he wants
05:45to at any given point of time, when, and if something does not go to the liking of the
05:50Russians, just, uh, accusing the Ukrainians of a provocation and a vital violating the
05:55terms of the ceasefire. It's all in the interpretation. He could sign anything he wants.
05:58Indeed. And he does have a, obviously a track record of ignoring things that he has signed.
06:04Let's take a listen to the words of Donald Trump, who says there is a U S delegation
06:08on its way to Moscow to talk to Russia.
06:12There are things you could do that, that wouldn't be pleasant in a financial sense. I can do
06:17things financially that would be very bad for Russia. I don't want to do that because
06:20I want to get peace. I want to see peace and we'll see, but in a financial sense, yeah,
06:26I could do things very bad for Russia. It would be devastating for Russia, but I don't
06:30want to do that because I want to see peace.
06:32He wants to see peace. He's threatening sanctions against Russia. Of course, all along, he's
06:36been actually sort of playing to Russia's, Russia's hand, doesn't he really?
06:39He's being, yeah. And he's being a bit coy here. Uh, generally the Russians do, even
06:42if there is this caution, uh, distrust still of the Americans, they're not entirely on
06:47side. They do. They are lucky with Donald Trump. Uh, look, like I said, he's not letting
06:52Donald Trump dictate the terms. What the Russians do want though, ultimately with the Americans
06:56and this is where Trump does have some leverage is they want to get their economy back, uh,
07:00you know, on a, on a good footing.
07:02And that does, the Americans could help a lot with that, with investment, both in oil
07:06and gas and technology. Yes, Russia definitely wants that. Putin is cognizant of that. But
07:11like I said, it goes back to that first question you asked me, Putin is going to do this on
07:15his terms. Putin doesn't let himself be bullied by anyone. He's not cowed by anyone, no matter
07:19how much pressure is brought, brought to bear on Putin. At the end of the day, you could
07:23say the same about Donald Trump. Putin's about Putin and what his objectives are and
07:28he is going to stick to those through thick and thin. So Donald Trump, he's very good
07:32at playing that bully role, but he's up against quite a formidable adversary. Uh, when it
07:37comes to negotiating tactics, Putin right now is working on his own clock.
07:41Doctors, thank you very much indeed. Let's get some reaction then to