The Kremlin said on Tuesday that it was Ukraine’s sovereign right to decide whether it wanted to join the European Union, and that Moscow did not intend to dictate to Kyiv how it should approach the question.
Asked if Ukraine could one day join the European Union, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: “This is the sovereign right of any country.”
“We are talking about integration and economic integration processes. And here, of course, no one can dictate anything to any country, and we are not going to do that,” he said.
Peskov added, however, that Russia’s position was different when it came to Ukraine joining military alliances.
“There is a completely different position, of course, on security-related issues related to defence or military alliances,” he said, without specifically mentioning NATO.
The comments came as US and Russian officials began meeting on Tuesday in Riyadh for the highest-level talks to date between the two former Cold War foes.
They were expected to discuss ways to end the three-year-old conflict in Ukraine and restore American-Russian relations. Their talks could pave the way for a summit between US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin.
Ukraine, which is not attending, says no peace deal can be made on its behalf. “We, as a sovereign country, simply will not be able to accept any agreements without us,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said last week.
