Putin has consistently rejected calls to pause his nearly three-and-a-half year assault on Ukraine despite growing pressure from US President Donald Trump, who issued a 10-day ultimatum earlier this week to stop the fighting.
"We need a lasting and stable peace on solid foundations that would satisfy both Russia and Ukraine, and would ensure the security of both countries," Putin told reporters.
But he added that "the conditions (from the Russian side) certainly remain the same".
Russia has frequently called on Ukraine to effectively cede control of four regions Moscow claims to have annexed, a demand Kyiv has called unacceptable.
Ukraine has been pleading with its Western backers to send more weapons for its troops to withstand Moscow's daily attacks and levy more sanctions on Russia and its trading partners.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been pushing for a meeting with Putin to end the conflict, with Kyiv proposing talks by the end of August.
Zelensky on Friday repeated that call.
"We understand who makes the decisions in Russia and who must end this war," he said on social media.
Ukraine was ready "to meet at the level of leaders at any time", he added.
Putin, speaking alongside Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, also said Moscow had started mass producing Oreshnik -- its hypersonic nuclear-capable missile.
Russia used Oreshnik to strike the city of Dnipro in central Ukraine last year before announcing it could deploy the missile in Belarus, its close ally.
"Our specialists, both Belarusian military specialists and Russian specialists, have chosen a place for future positions," Putin said.
"Work is now underway to prepare these positions. So, most likely, we will close this issue by the end of the year," he added.
Zelensky urges allies to seek 'regime change' in Russia
Kyiv, Ukraine (AFP) July 31, 2025 -
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday urged his allies to bring about "regime change" in Russia, hours after a Russian drone and missile attack on Kyiv killed 16 people including a six-year-old boy.
The overnight strikes reduced part of a nine-storey apartment block in Kyiv's western suburbs to rubble and wounded at least 150 people in the capital, authorities said.
The Russian army meanwhile claimed to have captured Chasiv Yar, a strategically important hillside town in eastern Ukraine where the two sides have been fiercely fighting for months.
Moscow has stepped up its deadly aerial assaults on Ukraine in recent months, resisting US pressure to end its nearly three-and-a-half-year invasion as its forces grind forward on the battlefield.
Speaking virtually to a conference marking 50 years since the signing of the Cold War-era Helsinki Accords, Zelensky said he believed Russia could be "pushed" to stop the war.
"But if the world doesn't aim to change the regime in Russia, that means even after the war ends, Moscow will still try to destabilise neighbouring countries," he said.
- Kyiv bombarded -
From late Wednesday to early Thursday, Russia fired over 300 drones and eight cruise missiles at Ukraine, with Kyiv the main target, the Ukrainian air force said.
One missile tore through a nine-storey residential building in the west of the capital, ripping off its facade, authorities said.
AFP journalists at the scene saw rescuers scouring through a smouldering mound of broken concrete, the belongings of residents scattered among the debris.
"It's a shock. I still can't get my bearings. It's very frightening," Valentyna Chestopal, a 28-year-old resident of Kyiv, told AFP.
Among the victims was a six-year-old boy who died on the way to hospital, the head of the city's military administration, Tymur Tkachenko, posted on Telegram.
Zelensky said late Thursday that over 150 people had been injured, "including 16 children and six policemen", denouncing the "unimaginable scale of terror and brutality" of the Russian strikes.
The Russian army said it had hit a military airfield, ammunition warehouse and drone production facilities with a combined overnight strike using weaponry and drones.
The attack came just days after US President Donald Trump issued a 10-day ultimatum for Moscow to halt its invasion, now in its fourth year, or face sanctions.
Trump on Thursday blasted Russia's actions in Ukraine, suggesting that new sanctions against Moscow were coming.
"Russia -- I think it's disgusting what they're doing. I think it's disgusting," Trump told journalists.
"We're going to put sanctions," he said, before adding: "I don't know that sanctions bother him," referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
- Key capture in east -
Russia said Thursday that it had captured the town of Chasiv Yar, a strategically important military hub for Ukrainian forces in the eastern Donetsk region.
Zelensky called Moscow's claim "Russian disinformation", saying that "Ukrainian units are defending our positions."
Ukrainian military analyst Oleksandr Kovalenko said Russian forces "have full control over the entire northern and eastern part" of Chasiv Yar, including districts that had been hardest to get.
But he said fighting for the western side was ongoing, with the situation "very difficult".
Taking control of Chasiv Yar would be a major military gain for Russia, which has been making steady territorial gains for months.
Home to around 12,000 people before the war but now largely destroyed, the town could allow Russian forces to advance on remaining civilian strongholds in the eastern Donetsk region.
The Kremlin has made the capture of the Donetsk region a priority since it claimed the industrial region as part of Russia in September 2022.
- Anti-corruption bill overturned -
Thursday's attacks came just hours before Ukrainian lawmakers overturned a highly criticised law, signed by Zelensky last week, that would have curbed the powers of two anti-graft bodies.
Zelensky reversed course after the legislation sparked the biggest public unrest in Ukraine since Russia's invasion began in February 2022.
The original law had put the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAPO) under the direct authority of the prosecutor general, who is appointed by the president.
Critics took to the streets in protest, saying the move would facilitate presidential interference in corruption probes.
The European Union said the bill could derail anti-corruption reforms that are key for joining the bloc.
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