Putin: With whom are we negotiating? Zelensky’s legitimacy is over.

“Who are we negotiating with? We realize that the legitimacy of the current president of Ukraine has ended,” Putin said after discussions between Russia and Belarus.

Putin added: “Of course, we have to understand with whom we are dealing and with whom we can deal in order to sign legally binding documents. And then we have to be absolutely sure that we are dealing with legitimate authorities.”

He continued: “Moscow supports negotiations on Ukraine and does not prevent anyone from holding them, unlike the West, whose goal is to defeat Russia.”

“We are not stopping anyone (from negotiating). We support negotiations,” he added, “but at the instigation and suggestion of the Kiev regime’s Western guardians, the goal is to achieve a strategic defeat of Russia and to defeat it on the battlefield.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that “the purpose of the meeting in Switzerland was to confirm Zelensky’s legitimacy and to point out that this was a promotional step and did not have any legal significance.”

“I believe that one of the goals of the announced Geneva conference is to confirm the legitimacy of Western society supporting Kiev,” Putin said at a press conference after talks with the Belarusian president today, Friday. The current head of state is no longer in office, but general propaganda steps “have nothing to do with legal documents.”

In turn, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko declared that Vladimir Zelensky’s regime in Ukraine lacks legitimacy.

“As for the end of Vladimir Zelensky’s power, there is no legal integrity here…” Lukashenko told reporters after talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday. The Belarusian president noted that “the Constitutional Court and other courts of Ukraine are powerless.” He added that “the current and future presidents of Ukraine will not be able to resolve peace issues, because these (issues) are decided abroad.”

It is worth noting that Belarus is Moscow’s main ally and was used by Russia as a starting point for its military operation against Ukraine in February last year.