VLADIVOSTOK. Sept 12 (Interfax) - Russia cannot stop hostilities while Ukraine continues its counteroffensive, Russian President Vladimir Putin said.
"I have been asked by people from many sides with whom we communicate and who would like to act as intermediaries if we are ready to stop the hostilities. How can we stop the hostilities when the opposite side is conducting a counteroffensive?" Putin said at a plenary meeting of the Eastern Economic Forum.
"What shall we do? They continue to counterattack, and we say what, 'We stop.' We are not Trotskyists after all. 'The movement is everything, the final goal nothing,' is a bad theory," Putin said.