For Western audiences, Kremlin ramping up rhetoric regarding "partition" of Ukraine - ISW

This is stated by the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) think tank.

Deputy Chairperson of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev claimed on February 5 that purported European plans to construct a railway line from Spain to Lviv City are evidence of the West’s acknowledgement that Lviv City would be “the new capital of Ukraine within the borders of [Lviv Oblast],” presumably following the end of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

"The plan, notably, has nothing to do with Ukrainian borders or an end state to the war in Ukraine and is an independent European infrastructure project," ISW emphasized.

It is noteworthy that Medvedev published the statement on his English-language account on X, not on the Russian-language Telegram, which indicates that his statement targeted an international audience, not a domestic one, ISW analysts note.

Medvedev's statement is likely in an effort to reduce Western military support for Ukraine and normalize Western discussions that push Ukraine to cede much of its territory and people to Russia as a legitimate way to end the war, the ISW report said.

According to analysts, Russian President Vladimir Putin and other senior Russian officials have recently reignited the narrative framing the invasion of Ukraine as an “historically justified imperial conquest” and proposed to a largely Russian-speaking audience in December 2023 that Russia and European powers could “partition Ukraine” and leave it as “sovereign” state within the borders of Lviv region.

As Ukrinform reported earlier, ISW previously wrote that Russian President Vladimir Putin emphasized plans to integrate the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine into the Russian Federation within the next six years, which indicates the long-term nature of his intentions.