Putin says Russia doesn't want to capture Kharkiv as troops advance
But Kremlin leader threatens to turn Ukrainian region into a buffer zone.
The Kharkiv region was the scene of a Russian assault soon after the Kremlin's all-out war started in February 2022. | Anatolii Stepanov/AFP via Getty Images
Vladimir Putin said Friday that Russia isn’t planning to capture the city of Kharkiv in Ukraine’s northeast, a region where his invading forces have been pushing forward in recent days.
The Russian president hit out at Ukraine for targeting Russian border regions and said that, while he has no plans to take Kharkiv, he does want to turn the area into a buffer zone.
“When it comes to what is happening around Kharkiv, that is their fault too,” Putin said according to a video posted on the Kremlin website. “Because they have been shelling and sadly continue to target residential neighborhoods in the border areas, including Belgorod. And I have said publicly that if this will continue we will be forced to create a safe zone, a sanitary zone. That is what we are doing.”
“As for Kharkiv, we have no such plans [to capture it] today,” he added.
The Russian leader’s words will be no comfort to Ukrainians. Since long before Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, Putin has said one thing about Ukraine while often doing something altogether more aggressive.
The Kharkiv region was the scene of a Russian assault soon after the Kremlin’s all-out war started in February 2022, but Ukrainian forces pushed the Russians out during a lightning counteroffensive in the fall of the same year.
Putin’s remarks, delivered during an ongoing trip to China, came after Ukraine hit Russian territory and the occupied Crimean peninsula with a large-scale drone attack Friday, setting an oil refinery on fire and killing two people, according to Russian officials.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said air defenses shot down 51 Ukrainian drones over Crimea, 44 over the Krasnodar region and six over the Belgorod region.
But in the Tuapse, Kranodar region, the drone attacks set an oil refinery on fire, though officials said the blaze was quickly extinguished, according to the Moscow Times.
In the Belgorod region, local governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram that a kamikaze drone killed a mother and young child who were passengers in a car.
