Vladimir Putin adopted a different tone regarding Ukraine's counteroffensive when asked about Kyiv's push to retake Russian-occupied territory, an independent Russian media outlet reported.
The Telegram channel Agentstvo compared the Russian president's reply to a question about the counteroffensive during a press conference with what he had said before about Ukraine's push which started around June 4.
Putin stood next to his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan after talks in the southern Russian city of Sochi and was asked by a journalist from state news agency Interfax about the deal allowing Ukraine to export grain safely through the Black Sea.
In the second part of the question, Putin was asked to comment on reports that the Ukrainian counteroffensive was "stalling" and whether Moscow was "ready for some kind of negotiations for a political and diplomatic settlement."
"As for the stalling of the counteroffensive, this is not a stalling, it is a fiasco," Putin said, according to a transcript on the Kremlin's website.
"In any case, this is how it looks today. Let's see what happens next. I hope that this will continue to be the case. I want to say that Russia has never refused negotiations, and now we are not refusing," he added, before changing the subject to Erdogan's position on the grain deal.
Ukrainian troops have reportedly been able to break through the first line of Russian defense in the southern sector of the front in the direction of Zaporizhzhia.
But Agentstvo reported how Putin had limited himself to a one-sentence answer about the counteroffensive where previously he would be far more expansive, giving details of Ukrainian losses of armored vehicles and troops.
The outlet noted how on June 13, Putin said that Ukraine had lost 160 tanks and 360 armored vehicles. Three days later, Putin reported Kyiv's losses at 186 tanks and 418 armored vehicles, which he claimed were 10 times higher than Russian losses.
By the end of June, Putin claimed Russia had destroyed 245 tanks and "about 678" armored vehicles of the Ukrainian Armed Forces since the start of the counteroffensive.
Agentstvo also noted how on June 29 at the Russia-Africa summit in St Petersburg, Putin said that his forces had destroyed more than 1,300 Ukrainian armored vehicles.
Meanwhile, on July 27 he had described how Ukrainian troops had suffered "heavy losses" which over the previous few days, included 200 troops, 26 tanks and 13 armored vehicles, Agentstvo said. Newsweek has contacted the Kremlin by email for comment.
There was no breakthrough over the grain deal during the talks between Erdogan and Putin, with the Russian president saying it would not be restored until the West meets obligations to facilitate Russian agricultural exports.
Correction 09/05/2023 7:48 a.m. ET: The spelling of Agentstvo was amended.
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Brendan Cole is a Newsweek Senior News Reporter based in London, UK. His focus is Russia and Ukraine, in particular ... Read more
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