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Russia says West blocking Ukraine peace talks

Iran Press TV

Sunday, 24 August 2025 6:54 PM

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has blamed Western countries, particularly Ukraine, for making excuses to block the peace negotiations.

Lavrov said in an interview with state TV on Sunday that the West was trying to ruin the peace initiative taken by US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Alaska summit earlier this month.

"They're just looking for a pretext to block negotiations," Lavrov told Rossiya in the interview published on Telegram.

He said the Ukrainian officials were making "attempts to disrupt the process that was laid down by Presidents Putin and Trump, which has yielded very good results."

Lavrov blamed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for creating an obstacle for the peace process by "obstinately insisting, setting conditions, demanding an immediate meeting at all costs" with Russia's leader. "We hope that these attempts will be thwarted."

Last week, Russia's top diplomat confirmed there will be no Putin-Zelensky meeting until the agenda for the peace deal between Kiev and Moscow has been agreed upon.

"There is no meeting planned... Putin is ready to meet with Zelensky, when the agenda would be ready for a summit, and this agenda is not ready at all," Lavrov said on Friday.

Russia's top diplomat pointed out that during the Alaska summit, the Russian leader had agreed to show some leniency on a number of issues raised by Trump.

He said that the meeting between Putin and Zelensky has not been planned, but the Russian leader is ready to meet him. Lavrov said such an agenda is currently nonexistent.

Lavrov said the Russian leader's meeting with Zelensky will be planned when the summit agenda is ready.

In the meantime, the war between Russia and Ukraine has continued to escalate with Kiev launching strikes on a Russian pipeline and a nuclear power plant.

Trump recently announced that Washington will be sending "massive" supplies of weapons to Ukraine, in what was described as a significant policy shift.

He advised the Ukrainians to go on the offensive if they wanted to get better results in negotiations.