Lithuanian president's aide says he still sees no Russian effort to end war

VILNIUS - As a new round of peace talks between Russia, Ukraine and the United States gets under way on Tuesday, the Lithuanian president's chief national security adviser, Deividas Matulionis, said he sees no genuine political effort by Moscow to end the war.

"We would very much like to hope that something will happen, but so far there are clearly no political efforts by Russia to end the war. There are technical-level discussions, but there is no political green light from Russia's top leadership," Matulionis told Ziniu Radijas.

The advisor said Russia continues to repeat the same cliches when talking about a possible end to the conflict, adding that the West should respond by increasing pressure on the Kremlin.

"It is simply baffling that there has been no breakthrough at all," he said.

The next round of talks in Geneva comes a week ahead of the fourth anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Matulionis said that while Europe is not directly involved in the talks, the continent's largest countries can convey their views to Washington.

Broader European involvement, he said, would be possible once it becomes clear that Russia is not pretending to negotiate, but is genuinely moving toward a peace agreement

"Sooner or later, Europe will have to sit at the negotiating table if the future European security architecture comes into question," the advisor said.

As reported by BNS, US President Donald Trump said on Monday he believes a peace deal will be reached quickly.

Moscow continues to demand major territorial and political concessions from Ukraine, which Kyiv says would amount to capitulation.