Question: Mr President, you have held a meeting with the heads of Russia’s largest oil companies to discuss the situation on the fuel market. In your assessment, how much damage are the enemy’s strikes on our energy infrastructure and industrial facilities causing?
And another very important issue: what is the situation with energy supplies to Crimea and Sevastopol?
President of Russia Vladimir Putin: As for the attacks on critical infrastructure in general, and energy infrastructure in particular, they are, of course, creating problems. That is obvious. We are currently seeing certain shortages, although they are not critical, as I will explain. There are several tasks we need to address, and we have just discussed them.
The first is to rapidly and significantly increase production of the air defence systems that are most in demand. We must also continue improving them in line with the requirements of combat operations and the protection of key facilities, taking into account the capabilities the enemy is deploying, including the new unmanned aerial vehicles with advanced technologies being supplied from Europe. We already have these defensive systems. The challenge is to accelerate their production and delivery, whether to the armed forces or for the protection of critical infrastructure.
It is also clear what needs to be done to ensure stable fuel supplies and eliminate the temporary shortages that have arisen. Repairs must be completed more quickly, the necessary level of imports must be secured and, as I have already said, these facilities must be reliably protected.
We also need closer coordination among all the agencies and levels of government involved in repelling drone and missile attacks on our infrastructure and, above all, in protecting people. The top priority is safeguarding civilians and minimising damage to the economy, individual industries and industrial production. As I have said, there has been damage, but all affected facilities are being quickly restored, and the problems that arise are not critical. Everything is operating steadily and with a substantial margin of resilience.
As for energy supplies to Crimea, the Minister has informed me that the region's monthly requirement is 70,000 tonnes. Current reserves in Crimea are sufficient for several days, but all demand will be met. We will continue increasing deliveries both overland and by sea. I am confident this task will be accomplished.
More broadly, I would like to stress that the strikes on our civilian infrastructure are intended not only to inflict damage on us – although I believe that is certainly one of the enemy’s objectives – but also to fuel an information campaign, or perhaps more accurately, an information operation as part of the broader confrontation with Russia. At a minimum, its purpose is to undermine our confidence in ourselves and our capabilities and, ideally, to create divisions within Russian society, force Russia to suspend, even temporarily, the advance of our forces along the line of contact and create conditions for launching negotiations on terms favourable to our adversary.
We will not give them that opportunity. It is all the more important to understand that these terrorist attacks have no impact whatsoever on the situation at the front. That is the key point. No matter where these strikes are carried out against our infrastructure, they have absolutely no effect on the situation on the frontline, along the line of contact.
Question: At the same time, we can all see that the talks with Ukraine and about Ukraine have come to a complete halt. However, at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, you indicated that contacts continue through other channels. If those contacts are ongoing, have there been any new requests, ideas or proposals from the other side? Have there been any new signals?
Vladimir Putin: Yes, contacts do continue. They have been established through several channels and along several lines. There is no secret about that.
There have also been new proposals. The suggestion of a meeting with the head of the Kiev regime is common knowledge. The request for at least a temporary ceasefire along the line of contact is no news either.
There have, however, been some new proposals, and I am prepared to mention a few of them. One is that both sides should stop carrying out long-range strikes deep inside each other’s territory. The reason for this proposal is obvious. Our retaliatory strikes deep inside Ukrainian territory are far more powerful, more effective and, frankly, more destructive, resulting in genuinely serious consequences for the Kiev regime.
Another proposal is to limit military operations – please note this carefully – to just four territories: the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions and the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics, while halting hostilities everywhere else. The reasoning here is equally clear. If we were to agree, it would allow the Ukrainian armed forces to redeploy troops from the Nikolayev, Dnepropetrovsk, Kharkov and Sumy regions, as well as from certain sections of the state border, to reinforce those four regions.
Given the Ukrainian armed forces’ catastrophic manpower shortage, they apparently believe this could provide them with a lifeline. But rescuing the Kiev regime is not part of our plans. That said, and I say this without the slightest irony, we consider every proposal coming from the other side with due attention.
At the same time, in the current circumstances, we cannot rule out attempts by the Ukrainian armed forces to carry out what they believe would be surprise diversionary attacks pursuing limited objectives by special forces units. Their aim would be to divert our attention and resources away from our primary objective: the final liberation of Donbass and Novorossiya.
Question: How would you assess the current situation along the line of contact? What do you see as the most important developments at this stage?
Vladimir Putin: We speak about this regularly. Incidentally, our military correspondents provide very comprehensive and, I would say, highly objective reporting on the situation in the media and online.
Let us begin in the north, with the North group of forces. As a reminder, the objective of Russian forces in the Sumy and Volchansk sectors is to establish a security zone along our border. This task was set following the Ukrainian armed forces’ incursion into the Kursk Region and the continuing attacks on our border areas.
The Ukrainian regime will pay for its crimes on Kursk soil by losing territory needed to create this border security zone.
Incidentally, our forces are now approximately 10.5 kilometres from the city of Sumy. It is the regional administrative centre, with more than 30,000 buildings, if I remember correctly. We have no political plans regarding either the city or the region as a whole. We will be guided by the recommendations of the Ministry of Defence and the General Staff. Our troops in this sector are operating actively and decisively and are advancing at a rapid pace.
Moving from north to south, we come to the West group of forces, which has a large area of responsibility. I will begin with the city of Kupyansk, where representatives of the Kiev regime like to stage photo opportunities against the city’s entrance sign. Our forces are now between 2.5 and 4–5 kilometres from the city’s western outskirts. The enemy has launched several counterattacks but has achieved no success.
Next is the Rubtsy sector. On the left bank of the Oskol River, we have effectively trapped a mixed enemy force of around 5,000 personnel. It has been pinned against the river. The Russian Armed Forces’ 1st Tank Army is pressing from the north, the 3rd Motor Rifle Division from the east, and the 144th Division from the south. The entire area is already under our fire control, and only about two kilometres remain before the encirclement is fully completed. The 144th Division is carrying out that task, and I believe it will do so successfully.
The fate of this enemy grouping will then resemble that of the force previously encircled near Kupyansk-Uzlovoye. If you recall, it found itself in much the same situation and was completely destroyed.
Next is the Krasny Liman sector. Krasny Liman is a fairly large town with around 11,000 buildings. More importantly, however, it is home to one of the largest railway marshalling yards in the former Soviet Union and is a key logistics hub in the Donetsk People’s Republic. Of its approximately 11,000 buildings, only 149 remain to be liberated.
To be continued.