AFP, Abu Dhabi

Moscow yesterday demanded Kyiv accept its conditions to end the four-year-war and vowed to press on with its invasion otherwise, as negotiations between the two sides opened in Abu Dhabi.

The US-mediated talks are the latest round of negotiations in a flurry of diplomacy that has so far failed to strike a deal to halt the war, unleashed by Russia’s February 2022 invasion.

The war has spiralled into Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II, with hundreds of thousands killed, millions forced to flee their homes in Ukraine and much of eastern and southern Ukraine decimated.

The Kremlin’s hardline rhetoric -- along with a massive Russian drone and missile barrage in the run-up to the talks, pounding Ukraine’s energy grid and knocking out power and heating in temperatures far below freezing -- threatened to overshadow any chances of progress in the Emirati capital.

“Our position is well known,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters yesterday as the talks got underway.

“Until the Kyiv regime makes the appropriate decisions, the special military operation continues,” he said, using Russia’s term for the offensive.

On Tuesday, Russian strikes on the southern Ukrainian region of Zaporizhzhia killed three -- including two teenagers -- and wounded at least 12 people, regional governor Ivan Fedorov said on Telegram.