Russia Rejects Zelenskyy Call for Troop Pullout, Saying Ukraine Must Accept ‘Realities’

Russia Rejects Zelenskyy Call for Troop Pullout, Saying Ukraine Must Accept ‘Realities’
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov attends an annual end-of-year news conference of Russian President Vladimir Putin, in Moscow on Dec. 23, 2021. Evgenia Novozhenina/Reuters
Reuters
Updated:

LONDON—Russia on Tuesday dismissed a peace proposal from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that would involve a pullout of Russian troops, saying Kyiv needed to accept new territorial “realities.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said those realities included Russia’s addition of four Ukrainian regions as its “new subjects”—annexations it proclaimed in September but which most countries of the United Nations have condemned as illegal.