The U.S.-Israeli war in Iran has led to peace talks on ending the war on Ukraine to go on a "situational pause," Russia said.
The Izvestia newspaper said in a front-page story that the Kremlin had confirmed a pause in talks on Ukraine and that war in the Middle East could push Kyiv toward compromise.
"This is a situational pause, for obvious reasons," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
Peskov said that as soon as the U.S. pays more attention to the war in Ukraine, the pause could end and a new round of negotiations could begin.
In Kyiv, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said it was time to end the pause and the U.S. had sent signals it was ready to continue negotiations.
A Ukrainian negotiating team was already on its way to the U.S. for weekend talks, Zelenskyy said.
It was not immediately clear what form the new talks would take or who would be taking part.
Izvestia said that talks on economic and investment cooperation with the United States, led by Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev, would continue.
The Kremlin on Thursday condemned what it called an intensification of Ukrainian attacks on Gazprom gas compressor stations serving two major pipelines, saying such incidents threatened critical infrastructure and international energy routes.
Gazprom said earlier that attacks on three compressor stations supporting the TurkStream and Blue Stream pipelines had increased in frequency this week, but all of them had been repelled.
The two pipelines carry Russian gas across the Black Sea to Turkey, from which some of it is pumped to European countries including Hungary, Slovakia, and Serbia.
They are Russia's last remaining pipeline routes serving Europe.
Ukraine, forced to boost gas imports after Russia damaged its gas production infrastructure, has begun storing gas in its underground sites in preparation for the next heating season, European AGSI data showed on Thursday.
Since last autumn, Russia has been attacking the Ukrainian power grid nearly daily, targeting both power stations and gas fields, most of which are in frontline regions.
The countries, which have been at war since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, remain far apart on Russia's demand for Ukraine to cede control of Ukraine's entire Donetsk region.
Tulsi Gabbard, U.S. director of national intelligence, told the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday that Russia had "maintained the upper hand in its war against Ukraine."
"U.S.-led negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv are ongoing. Until such an agreement is met, Moscow is likely to continue fighting a war of attrition with the aim of degrading Kyiv’s ability and will to resist," Gabbard said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said he remains open to peace between the two countries. He originally said his terms for ending the war would be that Ukraine officially abandon its ambition of joining NATO and withdraw entirely from four regions Russia claims as its own.
Zelenskyy has questioned Putin's commitment to ending the war and maintains that Ukraine will not cede land that Russia has not captured.
Reuters contributed to this report.
Sam Barron ✉
Sam Barron has almost two decades of experience covering a wide range of topics including politics, crime and business.
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