{"id":786374,"date":"2026-05-10T11:02:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-10T11:02:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/786374\/"},"modified":"2026-05-10T11:02:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-10T11:02:14","slug":"putin-says-he-thinks-russia-ukraine-war-is-coming-to-an-end-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/786374\/","title":{"rendered":"Putin says he thinks Russia-Ukraine war is coming to an end"},"content":{"rendered":"

MOSCOW \u2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin <\/a>said on Saturday that he thought the Ukraine war was coming to an end, remarks that came just hours after he had vowed victory in Ukraine at Moscow\u2019s most scaled-back Victory Day parade in years.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI think that the \u2060matter is coming to an end,\u201d Putin told reporters of the Russia-Ukraine war, Europe\u2019s deadliest conflict since World War Two. He also said he would be willing to negotiate new security arrangements for Europe, and that his preferred negotiating partner would be Germany\u2019s former Chancellor Gerhard Schr\u00f6der.<\/a><\/p>\n

Russia\u2019s 2022 invasion of Ukraine triggered the most serious crisis in relations between Russia and the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, when many people feared the world was on the brink of nuclear war.<\/p>\n

The Kremlin has said peace talks brokered by U.S. President Donald \u2060Trump\u2019s administration were on pause. Putin has repeatedly vowed to fight on until all \u200bof Russia\u2019s \u2060various war aims are achieved in what Moscow calls the \u201cspecial military operation\u201d.<\/p>\n

Putin was speaking in the Kremlin after setting out his view of the causes of the war. He blamed \u201cglobalist\u201d Western leaders, saying they promised NATO would not expand eastward after the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall, \u2060but then tried to draw Ukraine into the European Union\u2019s orbit.<\/p>\n

His statement came just hours after the parade on the May 9 national holiday \u200bcelebrating the Soviet \u2060Union\u2019s victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two. The \u200cannual event pays homage to the 27 million Soviet citizens who perished in that war.<\/p>\n

Instead of the usual intercontinental ballistic missiles, tanks and missile systems<\/a> rolling across the cobbles of Red Square, Russia played a video of its military hardware in action on giant screens opposite the Kremlin walls.<\/p>\n

\"Parade.\"Russian servicemen march on Red Square during the Victory Day military parade in central Moscow on May 9, 2026.Alexander Zemlianichenko \/ Pool \/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Russian troops have been \u200cfighting in Ukraine for well over four years. That is longer than Soviet forces fought \u200cin World War Two, known in Russia as the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45.<\/p>\n

War rumbles on<\/p>\n

Putin, who has ruled Russia as president or prime minister since the last day of 1999, faces a wave of anxiety in Moscow about the war in Ukraine, which has killed hundreds of thousands of people, left swathes of Ukraine in ruins, and drained Russia\u2019s $3 trillion economy. Russia\u2019s relations with Europe are worse \u2060than at any time since the depths of the Cold War.<\/p>\n

Russian forces have so far been unable to take the whole of the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine where Kyiv\u2019s forces have been pushed back to a line of fortress cities. Russian advances have slowed this year, though Moscow controls just under one fifth of Ukrainian territory.<\/p>\n

After Russia and Ukraine accused each other of violating unilateral ceasefires<\/a> they had each declared over recent days, U.S. President Donald Trump announced a three-day ceasefire from Saturday to Monday that was supported by the Kremlin and Kyiv. The two sides also agreed to exchange 1,000 prisoners.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d like to see it stop. Russia-Ukraine – it\u2019s the worst thing since World War Two in terms of life. Twenty-five thousand young soldiers every month. It\u2019s crazy,\u201d Trump told reporters in Washington.<\/p>\n

He \u200cadded that he would \u201clike to see a big extension\u201d of the ceasefire. There were no reports of violations of the ceasefire from either \u200bMoscow or Kyiv.<\/p>\n

European talks<\/p>\n

European Council President Antonio Costa said last week he believed there was \u201cpotential\u201d for the E.U. to negotiate with Russia, \u200cand to discuss the future of the security architecture of Europe.<\/p>\n

Asked if \u2060he was willing to engage in talks with the Europeans, Putin said the preferable figure for him was Schr\u00f6der, a longstanding friend of Putin.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor me personally, the former Chancellor \u2060of the Federal Republic of Germany, Mr. Schr\u00f6der, is preferable,\u201d Putin said.<\/p>\n

European leaders have said Russia must be defeated in Ukraine and cast Putin as a war criminal and autocrat who they say could \u200cone day attack a NATO member if \u200bhe is allowed to win the war. Russia dismisses such claims as nonsense.<\/p>\n

Putin, \u200cwho ordered troops into Ukraine in February 2022, casts European powers as \u200bwarmongers for supporting Ukraine with tens of billions of dollars in support, weapons and intelligence.<\/p>\n

Asked about Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy<\/a>, Putin said a meeting was possible only once a lasting peace deal was agreed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MOSCOW \u2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that he thought the Ukraine war was coming to…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":786375,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[50,103],"class_list":{"0":"post-786374","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=786374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786374\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/786375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=786374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=786374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=786374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}