Live: Russia rejects Biden’s terms for Ukraine talks, says offensive will continue

Issued on: 02/12/2022 – 11:16

10:46am: Russia rejects Biden’s terms for Ukraine talks

The Kremlin on Friday rejected US President Joe Biden’s terms for Ukraine talks with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, saying Moscow’s offensive will continue.

“What did President Biden say in fact? He said that negotiations are possible only after Putin leaves Ukraine,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, adding Moscow was “certainly” not ready to accept the conditions.

“The special military operation is continuing,” Peskov said, using the Kremlin term for the assault on Ukraine.

U.S. President Joe Biden said on Thursday he had no immediate plans to contact Putin but was prepared to speak with the Russian president if he showed an interest in ending the war in Ukraine. Biden said he would only do that in consultation with NATO allies.

>> Biden, Macron vow unity on Ukraine, promise to hold Russia accountable

10:38am: Three killed in Russian attack in Kherson, govenor says

Three people were killed and seven wounded in Russian shelling of the southern Ukrainian region of Kherson over the past 24 hours, the regional governor said on Friday.

Governor Yaroslav Yanushevych wrote on the Telegram messaging app that Russian troops had bombarded the city of Kherson and other parts of the region 42 times in the same period.

The city of Kherson was liberated by Ukrainian forces in mid-November after months of Russian occupation, but has been under fire since then from Russian troops who retreated to the opposite side of the River Dnipro.

5:06am: Europe ‘not strong enough’ to stand up to Russia alone, says Finnish PM

Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin on Friday offered a “brutally honest” assessment of Europe’s capabilities in the wake of Russia’s war on Ukraine, stating bluntly that “we’re not strong enough” to stand up to Moscow alone.

Visiting Australia, the leader of the pending NATO member said Vladimir Putin’s invasion and occupation of neighbouring Ukraine had exposed both European weaknesses and strategic blunders in dealing with Russia.

“I must be very honest, brutally honest with you, Europe isn’t strong enough right now. We would be in trouble without the United States,” she told Sydney’s Lowy Institute think tank.

Marin insisted Ukraine must be given “whatever it takes” to win the war, adding that the United States had been pivotal in supplying Kyiv with the weapons, finance and humanitarian aid necessary to blunt Russia’s advance.

“We have to make sure that we are also building those capabilities when it comes to European defence, the European defence industry, and making sure that we could cope in different kinds of situations,” she said.

12:40am: Ukraine to investigate Moscow-linked church, Zelensky says

Ukraine’s top security officials have ordered an investigation into the activities of a branch of the Orthodox Church linked historically to Moscow, President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Thursday.

Zelensky said the probe would look into whether the Moscow branch of the church was entitled to operate at one of Ukraine’s most hallowed sites – the Pechersk Lavra complex in Kyiv.

The Orthodox Church in Russia has lavishly backed the Kremlin’s nine-month-old invasion of Ukraine.

“We have to create conditions so that no actors dependent on the aggressor state (Russia) can manipulate Ukrainians and weaken Ukraine from within,” Zelensky said in a video address.

In Ukraine, the Moscow-linked church formally severed ties with the Russian Orthodox Church last May, but is still mistrusted by many Ukrainians and accused of secret co-operation with Russia.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)