May 31 (Reuters) – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in an interview broadcast on Sunday, said he wanted to press on with talks on securing peace with Russia before the onset of winter to take account of Kyiv’s improved strategic position.
Talks brokered by the United States on moving toward a peace accord have stalled as Washington has focused on the conflict in Iran.
Zelenskiy and other Ukrainian officials have said the advance of Russian forces has slowed on the ground while Ukraine has intensified a campaign of medium- and long-range strikes inside Russia, targeting mainly Russia’s oil industry.
“It began in December 2025, Russia began to lose the initiative on the battlefield,” Zelenskiy told CBS Television’s ‘Face the Nation’.
“So now we have this period of time before the winter… before the winter we need to find a way, diplomatic way, to sit and to speak,” Zelenskiy said, adding that it depends on the pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin, “the pressure in his society, and I think that is increasing, the pressure by sanctions — not to lift them, to put more.”
Zelenskiy said there was also the possibility of negotiations organised with European help or bilateral talks with Russia, but he repeated his call to impose tougher sanctions on Russia.
A senior Ukrainian commander told Reuters in an interview last week that Ukraine had a six-month window in which to seize the battlefield initiative and strengthen its hand for peace talks.
Brigadier General Andriy Biletsky, who commands Ukraine’s respected Third Army Corps, said he believed Russia’s army was exhausted and incapable of making major breakthroughs.
In his comments to ‘Face the Nation’, Zelenskiy also said that in the absence of a European anti-missile defence programme, Ukraine needed help from the United States in supplying air defence missiles.
“Until the moment we will produce our European anti-ballistic system, until this moment, we need support from the United States,” he said.
Ukraine hoped to clinch a deal with the United States on joint drone technology, he said, with Kyiv able to provide expertise from five years of downing Russian drones and missiles.
“We have already drone deals with some Middle East countries and we have already drone deals with some European countries,” he said. “Now we’re preparing the big drone deal with the European Union and I hope that we will have such decisions with American partners. I count on it.”
(Reporting by Ron PopeskiEditing by Bill Berkrot)
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