Zelensky: Talks failure will mean WWIII

Kyiv, March 21 : As Ukraine rejects to bow down to Russia, amid Moscow’s warning to besieged Mariupol to surrender, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky once more reminded the world that if negotiations did not work out, it will spell a global disaster. His deputy rejecting the Russian demand to give up the city of Mariupol by 5 am Monday (Moscow time), said there is “no question of any surrender”. The Russian Ministry of Defence had offered to open humanitarian corridors in exchange for a surrender of the city, the BBC reported. It comes as Ukraine’s president alleged that Russia committed war crimes in Mariupol, where heavy fighting has reached the centre on Day 29. Zelensky has said that he believes a failure to negotiate the end of Russia’s invasion will mean “a third world war”. Speaking to CNN on Sunday, Zelensky said he is ready to deal directly with Russian President Vladimir Putin, adding that he believes that negotiations are the only way to end the fighting. “I think that we have to use any format, any chance in order to have a possibility of negotiating,” he said. However, Zelensky said that he rejected any agreement that would require Ukraine to recognise Russian-sponsored separatist regions as independent. The Ukrainian president once more said he believed that if his country were a NATO member, “a war wouldn’t have started”. “If NATO members are ready to see us in the alliance, then do it immediately,” he said. “Because people are dying on a daily basis”. Moscow’s humanitarian promises cannot be trusted, according to Pyotr Andryushenko, an adviser to the mayor of Mariupol, and the city will not going to stop defending itself, he said. “We will fight until the last of our soldiers,” Andryushenko told the BBC. Andryushenko repeated unconfirmed claims made by other Mariupol officials in recent days that Russian forces have been forcibly evacuating some of its residents to Russia. “When they (Russian forces) say about humanitarian corridors, what do they really do? They really force evacuate our people to Russia,” he said. As did happen during past humanitarian corridor calls, when even Indian students were stuck in Sumy. Earlier, an art school in the city, where about 400 people were sheltering, was attacked, the city council said. On Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelensky spoke to Israel’s parliament by video link, as part of efforts to rally global support. “We want to live. Our neighbours want to see us dead,” he told Israeli MPs. ING

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