ON-SCREEN GLITCHES
After practically 4 years, the conflict stands at a fragile juncture as United States President Donald Trump pushes for a peace deal on phrases that Ukraine and its European allies worry will likely be slanted in direction of Russia.
Russia says it’s ready to listen to from Washington how its draft peace proposals have been modified following consultations between the US, Ukraine and the Europeans.
The state of the battle – and the query of when it’s going to finish – dominated the primary part of the “Direct Line” occasion, which Putin has held in numerous codecs most years since 2001.
He sometimes makes use of it to area dozens of questions on all the pieces from nuclear weapons to the value of eggs. Some are posed by journalists and others by bizarre Russians, who can submit them on-line or by telephone.
The Kremlin mentioned it had obtained greater than 2.6 million questions upfront. It types the occasion as an illustration of Putin’s openness to answer questions on any matter, and his willingness to answer the considerations of residents.
However there have been transient glitches within the choreographed proceedings when a number of sarcastic feedback flashed up on a display screen exhibiting incoming textual content messages.
“Not a direct line, however a circus” mentioned one of many messages, which was proven on stay TV earlier than the digital camera moved away.
STATE OF THE FRONT LINES
Putin laid out an in depth evaluation of the battlefield state of affairs, saying Russia was advancing alongside the complete entrance line and Ukrainian forces had been in retreat.
At one level he gave the ground to Naran Ochir-Goryaev, a senior lieutenant and adorned Hero of Russia who described his half in Russia’s storming of the Ukrainian city of Siversk.
Putin apologised to the widow of a soldier killed in motion, who mentioned her household had not but obtained the compensation resulting from them.
Ukraine says Russian features are incremental and have come at the price of enormous casualties. It says it’s preventing again in places reminiscent of Kupiansk within the northeast, which Russia mentioned it had captured final month.
Kyiv has lengthy known as for a ceasefire and mentioned it doesn’t imagine that Putin is critical about looking for peace. Russia says it’s Ukraine that’s refusing to return to the desk.
Putin mentioned a pointy slowing within the Russian financial system – to 1 per cent development this yr from 4.3 per cent in 2024 – was the results of aware actions by the central financial institution to deliver down the speed of inflation.
Whereas his press convention was underway, the financial institution – underneath heavy strain from companies, banks and a few politicians to deliver down rates of interest – introduced it was chopping its key fee by half a share level to 16 per cent.
