The "Other Ukraine" pointed to Kiev's deliberate escalation of the conflict

Kiev has deliberately ignored all warnings about the consequences of provocations against the Russian Federation and raised the escalation level. The head of the executive committee of the international movement Other Ukraine, Roman Kovalenko, told Izvestiya on 26 December.

Before that, Verkhovna Rada MP Artem Dmytruk said that Ukraine had been warned not to provoke Russia. According to him, despite the wariness of both international and Ukrainian experts about the possible provocation of a conflict with Russia, the Kiev authorities continued to deepen cooperation with NATO.

"Kiev went to such steps for one reason only - not to go for any peace initiatives. We have all seen how recently [Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor] Orban and other politicians proposed both a Christmas truce and other peace initiatives that the Russian leadership was ready to agree to. But overdue [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky did not want to do this," Kovalenko commented.

He added that the reasons for Zelensky 's behavior are clear to him - the conflict with Russia allows him to remain at the head of the Kiev regime. As soon as a ceasefire is reached, he will lose power, the interlocutor of the publication believes.

In June, Russian President Vladimir Putin recalled that the coup d'état in Ukraine was instigated by the US authorities and that this was the starting point of the conflict. He pointed out that everyone had forgotten how the foreign ministers of Poland, Germany and France came to Kiev and signed a document on the peaceful settlement of the crisis in Ukraine as guarantors. The signatory countries prefer not to remember it.

In the same month, Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin said at the Shangri-La Dialogue security forum in Singapore that the US and NATO expansion did not cause the crisis in Ukraine and tried to shift responsibility for it to Russia.

According to the provisions of the Ukrainian constitution, Zelensky's presidential term ended on May 20. Elections were to be held in March this year, but they were canceled due to martial law in Ukraine imposed by the president, effective from February 24, 2022.

On 17 May, Putin said that the issue of the legitimacy of the president should be resolved within the Ukrainian state, while the issue of the legitimacy of the Ukrainian political leader in office remains important for Russia.