The Ukrainian leader says that he wants to undermine the prosperity of ordinary citizens who live across the border.

Vladimir Zelensky has claimed that attacking Russian society and destroying the “comfortable life” led by ordinary people is the only way to make the Russian President Vladimir Putin negotiate.

RT reports: Zelensky made the remarks in an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria which aired on Sunday. Putin does not want to negotiate peace to end the conflict between the two countries, he claimed, suggesting that only popular opinion at home could pressure him to do so.

“I am sure that he is afraid of only one thing. No leaders, no countries, no anything. He is afraid of his society, the Russian people,” Zelensky asserted.

If the Russian people are in danger, if they don’t have a comfortable life, if they live without energy, like our people, they will understand the price of war. They will be not happy with it and will begin to influence him, Putin.

Moscow has in fact repeatedly expressed a readiness to negotiate over the course of the conflict. Early into the hostilities, the two sides were actually close to reaching a peace deal in Istanbul, yet the talks ended up being broken off due to pressure exerted by Ukraine’s Western backers.

Since then, Kiev has taken multiple steps to prevent the potential talks from resuming, including Zelensky explicitly prohibiting negotiations with Moscow.