Russian President Vladimir Putin attends the International Arctic Forum in Murmansk, Russia, March 27, 2025.
Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened to “finish off” Ukrainian troops Friday and called for a “transitional administration” to oversee the war-torn nation instead of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Putin spoke on the sidelines of an Arctic forum Friday and suggested Russia hold discussions with the U.S. and Europe with the goal of “establishing a transitional administration in Ukraine” under the supervision of the United Nations, according to Agence France Presse.
“What for? To organise a democratic presidential election that would result in the coming to power of a competent government that would have the confidence of the people, and then begin negotiations with these authorities on a peace agreement and sign legitimate documents,” Putin added.
Putin also asserted that Russian forces were gradually moving towards achieving their goals at the start of the “special military operation,” the Russian euphemism for the war in Ukraine.
“I was saying not so long ago: ‘We will finish them off.’ There are reasons to believe that we will finish them off,” Putin boasted.
“We are gradually, not as fast as some would like, but nevertheless persistently and confidently moving toward achieving all the goals stated at the beginning of the special operation.”
Putin’s comments come after Ukrainian officials announced that Russia had violated the recent U.S.-brokered agreement to place a moratorium on striking energy infrastructure.
“They’ve been hitting our energy sites with bombs, attack drones, and FPV drones,” Zelenskyy’s communications adviser Dmytro Lytvyn wrote on X earlier this week. “We’re not going into all the details, but there have already been eight confirmed hits on energy facilities. Every night our air defense forces shoot down nearly a hundred attack drones – and many of those drones were likely targeting other energy facilities.”
Russia, in turn, accused Ukraine of violating the deal.
Elections are currently paused in Ukraine because of the ongoing war against Russia, consistent with Ukrainian law for military conflicts. Zelensky’s critics, including President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk, whose Starlink internet provider has been essential for Ukraine’s survival, have called Zelensky a “dictator” for maintaining power during the war without holding a new election.
The war between the two countries began when Russian forces invaded Ukraine in 2022 and unsuccessfully attempted to conquer their smaller neighbor, as Ukrainian forces shocked the world by repelling the Russian army. The Russians have maintained territorial footholds in eastern Ukraine throughout the war and the Russian defense ministry claims their forces have seen recent advances in the northeast.
The annual U.S. threat assessment released earlier this week warned that Russia “has seized the upper hand” over the past year, giving it greater leverage in cease-fire discussions, possible allowing them to receive significant concessions. The threat assessment was released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and lays out the U.S. intelligence community’s perspective on an array of global threats.
“Even though Russian President Putin will be unable to achieve the total victory he envisioned when initiating the large-scale invasion in February 2022, Russia retains momentum as a grinding war of attrition plays to Russia’s military advantages,” the document reads.
“This grinding war of attrition will lead to a gradual but steady erosion of Kyiv’s position on the battlefield, regardless of any U.S. or allied attempts to impose new and greater costs on Moscow.”
The Trump administration has initiated the early stages of cease-fire talks to put an end to the war in Ukraine. After a dispute between President Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and Zelensky at the White House last month, U.S. and Ukrainian negotiators agreed to a temporary 30 day deal to pause the fighting earlier this month, contingent on Russian cooperation.
Putin rejected the full-scale cease-fire, but later told Trump that he would agree to stop attacking energy infrastructure in Ukraine.
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James Lynch is a news writer for National Review. He previously was a reporter for the Daily Caller. He is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame and based in the Washington, D.C. area.