Putin has said his military incursion into Ukraine was because NATO's creeping expansion threatened Russia's security. He has demanded that Ukraine drop its NATO ambitions, that R

Russia will seek "ironclad" guarantees in any peace deal on Ukraine that NATO nations will exclude Kyiv from membership and that Ukraine will remain neutral, a Russian deputy foreign minister said in remarks published on Monday.

While Russian forces have staged a successful counteroffensive in the border region of Kursk in the last week, their attacks in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk have slowed to a halt. Ukrainians have begun launching counterattacks along that eastern line, particularly in Toretsk.