Moscow, April 21 Russia welcomes the United States statements that Ukraine’s potential NATO membership is off the table, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday.
“We have heard statements made at various levels in Washington that Ukraine's NATO membership is ruled out. This is something that brings us satisfaction and aligns with our stance,” Russian state-run news agency TASS quoted Peskov as saying.
US President Donald Trump stated earlier in the month that, despite Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s desire for Ukraine to join NATO, it would never happen. Trump also suggested that the Ukrainian conflict could have been triggered by Kyiv’s ambitions to join the alliance.
Meanwhile, Trump said that he hopes that a deal on settling the Ukrainian crisis will be made in the coming week.
“Hopefully Russia and Ukraine will make a deal this week. Both will then start to do big business with the United States of America,” he wrote on his Truth Social network.
On the other hand Russian President Vladimir Putin declared a cessation of hostilities on the eve of Easter, at a Saturday meeting with Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Valery Gerasimov. The 30-hour truce lasted between 6:00 p.m. Moscow time on April 19 and midnight on April 21.
Russian troops strictly complied with the ceasefire during the Easter truce and stayed at their lines and positions, Russia’s Defence Ministry reported on Monday.
“In compliance with the order by the supreme commander-in-chief of the Russian Armed Forces, all the battlegroups strictly observed the ceasefire and stayed at their lines and positions in the special military operation area during the specified time,” the ministry said in a statement.
However despite the declared Easter truce, Ukrainian armed formations kept delivering artillery fire and strikes by unmanned aerial vehicles on the positions of Russian troops and civilian facilities in the border areas of the Belgorod, Bryansk and Kursk Regions and the Republic of Crimea, the ministry stated.
A total of 4,900 ceasefire breaches by the Ukrainian army were registered during the truce, it said.
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