Putin’s latest warning to Ukraine shows how unlikely a peace deal is

Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned Moscow will take Ukrainian territory by force if Kyiv’s troops do not withdraw, signaling rigidity over a key sticking point in peace talks.

“Either we liberate these territories by force of arms, or Ukrainian troops leave these territories,” Putin, who is currently on a state visit to India, said in an interview with India Today. The comments, published by Russian state-controlled media, were translated by news agency Reuters and made in reference to Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region.

Russia is estimated to control more than 80% of the Donbas, where fighting between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed separatists started long before Russia’s full-scale invasion of 2022. The war in the region first began in 2014, when Russia invaded and annexed Crimea — a peninsular in southern Ukraine.

Capturing and officially annexing the Donbas region would enable Russia to create a land bridge to Crimea, a crucial military and trading hub for Moscow.

Under occupation, so-called referendums have shown up to 99% of residents in parts of the Donbas region voted to join the Russian Federation. Those referendums have been widely criticized as sham votes by the international community.

Putin’s comments came after he held a five-hour meeting with U.S. delegates Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner — U.S. President Donald Trump’s son in law — in Moscow on Tuesday.

During Thursday’s interview with India Today, Putin said Russia did not agree with some of the points outlined in the reworked U.S. peace proposals for Ukraine, labeling the negotiation process “difficult work.”

The original 28-point peace plan — drawn up by Russian and American officials, with no input from Ukraine — reportedly included a requirement that Ukraine concede territory in the Donbas to Russia. It was redrafted following talks between the U.S. and Ukraine, whose president Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly stated that any peace deal must honor Ukrainian sovereignty.

Marnie Howlett, a lecturer in Russian and East European politics at the University of Oxford, told CNBC on Friday that the war would only end when Russia stops attacking Ukraine.

“Given the Kremlin shows a lack of genuine interest in ending the conflict, no peace agreement is likely any time soon,” she said.

“Russia has failed to take Donbas by force since 2014, as Ukrainians have made clear they will not accept the illegal capture of their territory. No ‘deal’ is possible without Ukrainians’ support, and nearly 12 years of resistance show that they are unwilling to support territorial concessions.”

Emily Ferris, a senior research fellow at defense and security thinktank the Royal United Services Institute, agreed that Moscow is unlikely to be truly invested in making peace in Ukraine without land concessions being on the table.

“Currently, Russia sees no reason to come to the negotiating table because it is making – admittedly small – gains on the battlefield and there is no offer that meets their demands,” she told CNBC. “The two sticking points are European military support for Ukraine – the so-called security guarantees and what that actually means – and of course the territorial issue, which Moscow is counting on Ukraine to compromise on.”

Speaking at the 2025 Investor Summit conference at the London Stock Exchange on Thursday, Kim Darroch, who served as the U.K.’s ambassador to the U.S. during Trump’s first term, said he did not believe an end to the conflict in Ukraine was imminent.

“I don’t think the war is going to end anytime soon, unless the Ukrainians agree to capitulate and give up territory, plus to never join NATO and this kind of stuff which I think is basically impossible to concede and survive politically,” he told an audience.

“So, I think the war will drag on through the winter and beyond, which potentially is very dangerous for Europe, because I think if Trump can’t get a deal he may just walk away and stop weapons supplies to Ukraine and tell the Europeans, ‘it’s your problem, I tried to get a deal, so you do it.’ And then I’m not sure we actually have the capacity to provide Ukraine with what it needs.”

Global investors have been closely monitoring developments in the negotiations, with a breakthrough likely to have implications for markets across asset classes. Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 sparked an international sell-off of equities and huge volatility in energy markets as the Western world drastically reduced trade and investment in Russia. Concerns about Russian aggression have also led to a huge defense splurge across Europe, fueling a bull run on regional defense stocks.

— CNBC’s Holly Ellyatt contributed to this article.