Afrasianet - American journalist Candice Owens described Vladimir Zelensky as a "cocaine addict" actor who carries out what is asked of him, such as obstructing a peace settlement, stressing that his proposal for a ceasefire is nothing but a charade. 

Commenting on the remarks of the head of the illegitimate regime in Kiev announcing that he would wait for Russian President Vladimir Putin in Turkey on May 15, Owens wrote on her X account on the X platform: "The world is just a theater. Zelensky is  a cocaine-addicted actor  who did what he was told." 

Moscow to Kiev. Negotiate first and then truce

"Zelensky will now represent that he is seeking peace and a ceasefire similar to what Netanyahu did in Gaza. "These men are actually wholesale government-approved killers."

President Putin on Sunday called on Kiev to resume direct negotiations to end the crisis in Ukraine without preconditions, and proposed to hold them next Thursday, May 15 in Istanbul.

The Russian president also stressed that Moscow has repeatedly put forward ceasefire initiatives, but that the "regime in Kiev" has continued to systematically violate them, and the recent three-day truce marking the eightieth anniversary of victory in the Great Patriotic War does not fall out of this scope.

With Franceand Germany insisting  on a thirty-day truce ahead of the Istanbul meeting, Zelensky came out to say he would travel to Turkey to meet with President Putin on Thursday. He expects a full and permanent ceasefire from Monday.

Zelenskiy's remarks came after US President Donald Trump spoke of the need for Kiev to respond immediately to the Russian president's initiative, describing it as  a "positive development" beneficial to both sides.

Ankara, through a source in the Turkish presidency, said  there was no information about Zelenskiy's plans to visit Turkey on May 15 for talks on resolving the conflict in Ukraine.

Trump's reaction to Putin's proposal for direct talks with Ukraine

US President Donald Trump has called the proposal of his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to resume direct negotiations with Ukraine a "great event" for Russia and Ukraine. 

Trump wrote on the Truth Social platform: "Potentially great day for Russia and Ukraine! Think of the hundreds of thousands of lives that will be saved as the ongoing bloodbath ends, the world will become new and much better."

"I will continue to work with both sides to achieve this, and the United States wants to focus on reconstruction and trade rather than war," he said. We have a busy week ahead of us."

President Putin called on Kiev to resume direct negotiations to end the crisis in Ukraine without preconditions, and proposed to hold them next Thursday (May 15) in Istanbul.

Putin stressed that he does not rule out the possibility of a real ceasefire to which Ukraine is committed, noting his intention to hold talks soon with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan to search for ways to achieve peace.

He stressed that Moscow had repeatedly put forward ceasefire initiatives, but Kiev was blocking those efforts.

In March 2022, the first negotiations between Russia and Ukraine took place in Belarus after the start of the Russian military operation, but they did not yield any tangible results.

On March 29, 2022, a second round of negotiations was held in Istanbul, where Moscow received for the first time from Kiev the principles of a written future agreement.

The principles contained commitments to Ukraine's neutrality and its refusal to deploy weapons, including nuclear weapons, to foreign countries on its territory, but the negotiation process by Ukraine stalled.