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The Weekly paper of the New Communist Party of Britain

Russia calls for genuine peace in Ukraine

by our Eastern European affairs correspondent

Russian President Vladimir Putin has responded positively and firmly to the American call for a 30-day standstill cease-fire in Ukraine. Retired British military chiefs say the Labour government must now consider bringing back conscription to boost military readiness for a possible war with Russia and nearly 100 people were arrested after protesters gathered at Trump Tower in New York on Thursday to denounce the arrest of Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian activist detained over his involvement with pro-Palestinian demonstrations at Columbia University.

Russia is ready for a ceasefire Putin told the media but such an agreement “must lead to long-term peace”, the president said following a meeting with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko at the Kremlin in Moscow this week. The “idea” of a ceasefire is the “right one”, Putin told journalists. “We absolutely support it. We endorse the idea of resolving the conflict through peaceful means,” he said.

But certain matters still need to be resolved before a truce can be reached, including the retreat or surrender of Ukrainian troops encircled in a small pocket of Russian territory that they seized last year, and the systems of “control and verification” to monitor the ceasefire regime and prevent the Ukrainians using the pause in hostilities to re-arm and reinforce their troops on the frontline. And ultimately there must be a very clear understanding of the nature of the final settlement. All this will have to be sorted out with the Americans, Putin said. Maybe in direct talks with Donald Trump.

Preparations are certainly underway for a face-to-face meeting between Trump and Putin – possibly in Switzerland, Saudi Arabia or even Belarus. But as Putin said, there’s still some way to go. Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff sorted out some problems when he met senior Russian officials in Moscow this week – much to the dismay of the Starmer government and the Western European powers whose attempts to get a seat at the bargaining table have been side lined once again by the Trump team. Their bogus 30-day air and sea “temporary cease-fire” that was eagerly endorsed by the Zelensky regime was ignored in Washington.

The Americans favour a standstill cease-fire, which would only give the Russians what they’ve already got while leaving the rest of Ukraine for themselves to plunder. Zelensky soon got the message. His survival depends on American aid, and the promise to restore the US military supplies and intelligence-sharing programmes that Trump briefly suspended was enough to make Zelensky see things their way. A brief meeting in Saudi Arabia prior to Witkoff’s flight to Moscow was all that was needed.

Although Putin wants to wait and see, others still trust the words of American imperialists. “Now they endlessly repeat “Trump, Trump” says Gennady Zyuganov, the Russian communist leader. “Roosevelt was forced to recognise our country and change policy when Hitler took him by the throat. But when the United States gained an advantage in nuclear weapons, Stalin was forced to urgently mobilise all resources and all scientists in response. And today you cannot count on Trump to come and solve everything. Its [his] term is 1,430 days. He is in a hurry to direct money to the development of America. He’s already “parked” Greenland, made sure that Canada expelled its prime minister, Mexico trembles, US ships sail the Panama Canal for free and the Gulf of Mexico has been renamed the American Gulf. He needs Ukraine only if it gives up everything that we once built together in it. But Trump did not say a single word about what to do with Bandera, with the Nazis…”