Kenneth Glad
Kyiv faces a new territorial demand as efforts to reopen negotiations continue through Washington. A separate court ruling has drawn attention to how the war is also being fought through education, propaganda and legal accountability.
The Kremlin has made Ukrainian withdrawal from areas it still controls in Donetsk Oblast a condition for further trilateral negotiations involving Russia, Ukraine and the United States.
Donetsk is one of the Ukrainian regions Moscow claims to have annexed, though Russian forces do not fully control it.
Ukrainska Pravda quoted Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov as saying: “Right now, Kyiv needs to take just one serious step, after which, firstly, military operations will be suspended, and secondly, prospects will open up for a serious discussion of the prospects for a further long-term settlement.”
Ushakov said Russia expected the move from Kyiv and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He also said that, without it, “trying to convince each other is largely a waste of time.”
U.S. talks
The demand would require Ukraine to surrender territory it still holds, a position Kyiv has repeatedly rejected during the war.
The Ukrainian outlet writes that Ukraine’s chief negotiator, Rustem Umierov, traveled to the United States on May 7 for meetings with President Donald Trump’s team.
According to Zelenskyy, the discussions were expected to cover prisoner exchanges, renewed diplomacy and security cooperation with Washington.
United24 Media reported, citing Ukrainian military and regional officials, that the Kremlin’s demand came as Russian strikes continued across several Ukrainian regions.
It said Russia used more than 100 drones and three missiles on May 6, 2026, with attacks reported in Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk and Sumy.
Textbook case
Kyiv is also using the courts to challenge Russian educational materials that Ukrainian prosecutors say are part of Moscow’s broader effort to justify the war and reshape public understanding of it.
According to Ukrainska Pravda, a Ukrainian court has sentenced Vladimir Medinsky and Anatoly Torkunov to 10 years in prison with confiscation of property. The case concerned a Russian 11th-grade history textbook published in 2023.
Medinsky is not only linked to the textbook case. He has also frequently headed Russian delegations in negotiations with Ukraine, making the ruling especially notable alongside Moscow’s latest conditions for renewed talks.
Ukraine’s Office of the Prosecutor General said that the textbook presented Russia’s aggression as legitimate, promoted occupation narratives and encouraged pupils to view recent events through the Kremlin’s political framing.
Prosecutors said the book was used from September 1, 2023, in occupied parts of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson and Crimea, as well as inside Russia.
The verdict forms part of Ukraine’s wider effort to pursue cases connected to what officials describe as Russian information aggression.
Sources: Ukrainska Pravda, United24 Media
