Volodymyr Zelenskiy gave an interview to five prominent Russian journalists in which the Ukrainian president discussed the Russian invasion and Kyiv’s conditions for a peace deal.
The Russian journalists mostly came from media outlets openly critical of the war: Novaya Gazeta’s Dmitry Muratov, TV Rain’s Tikhon Dzyadko, the author Mikhail Zygar, Meduza’s Ivan Kolpakov and Kommersant’s Vladimir Solovyov.
Not all of them could publish the remarks. Both Novaya Gazeta and Kommersant complied with the Russian censor’s ban on publishing the remarks, while most of the other outlets have been banned in Russia.
The easiest way for Russians to see what Zelenskiy said is on social media. More than 112,000 people have watched the interview in Russian on Zygar’s YouTube page and some quotes have been shared on Telegram. Russians need a VPN to read websites like TV Rain or Meduza.
On Monday, Novaya Gazeta announced it was halting operations because it had received a second warning for violating Russia’s “foreign agents” law, most likely in retaliation for the interview with Zelenskiy. The newspaper would cease to publish new material until the end of the “special military operation”, the official term in Russia for its war in Ukraine. The decision marks the temporary closure of Russia’s largest remaining independent media.
Why did Zelenskiy choose to speak to the Russian press?
Zelenskiy has made several attempts to appeal directly to Russians about the war and has said repeatedly that they can best convince Putin to abandon his invasion of Ukraine.
In an address shortly after the outbreak of the war, Zelenskiy addressed the Russian population in Russian, his native language, saying: “If the Russian leaders don’t want to sit with us behind the table for the sake of peace, maybe they will sit behind the table with you. Do Russians want the war? I would like to know the answer. But the answer depends only on you, citizens of the Russian Federation.”
What has Zelenskiy put on the table?
Zelenskiy has said that Ukraine is ready to discuss a “neutral status” with Russia, presumably one that would preclude the country from joining Nato, in exchange for security guarantees from attack in the future.
This is not a new statement from Zelenskiy, but it nonetheless has generated headlines as Ukraine and Russia go into a new round of negotiations in Istanbul this week.
Zelenskiy also said any agreement about “neutrality” would need to be confirmed in a nationwide referendum that would include Ukrainians who had been forced to flee the country. More than 10 million people have been displaced by the Russian invasion, according to some estimates.
The referendum could not take place while Russian forces remained on newly captured Ukrainian territory, he added, demanding Russian forces return to the territory they controlled before 24 February. “It’s a compromise,” he said. “Go back to where it all started, and there we will try to solve the issue of Donbas.”
Will it make a difference?
Probably not. Russia seems intent on capturing as much Ukrainian territory as possible before taking negotiations seriously. And Ukraine’s staunch defence of major cities has also galvanised the population, making it less likely that the public would accept any Russian ultimatum in a national referendum.
Zelenskiy has already made similar offers to discuss the country’s neutral status. But the need for Russia to leave territory that it has captured by force and for the west to step in as guarantors of a new security agreement conflicts with Putin’s core goal in this war: a Russian sphere of influence in eastern Europe.
How did it go down with the Kremlin?
Poorly. By Monday afternoon, the Kremlin claimed Vladimir Putin still had not read what was said in the interview and that any meeting between Zelenskiy and Russian president at the moment would only be “counterproductive”.
Meanwhile, the Russian media watchdog, Roskomnadzor, had warned news outlets not to run the interview with Zelenskiy, part of a wartime censorship effort that has also forbidden local media from calling the conflict an “attack”, “invasion”, or “war”.
Outlets such as Meduza and TV Rain have already been banned in Russia, so they can run the material freely. But others such as Novaya Gazeta and Kommersant have elected to toe the government line, meaning that the interview will not appear in their publications.
How will it have gone down with people in Russia who did see it?
Russian society is polarised, so it is unlikely an interview is going to change many minds. Those who read outlets like Meduza or TV Rain are far more likely to be opposed to the war, so they will probably be receptive to Zelenskiy’s point of view and want the Kremlin to abandon its invasion of Ukraine. But the fact that it hasn’t been run by more mainstream outlets means many Russians will not see the interview, or will only see what the state media eventually chooses to publish from it.
