ISTANBUL (AP) – “There is absolutely no evidence” that Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to negotiate peace in Ukraine, the head of the UK’s foreign intelligence agency said in a speech on Friday.
Secret Intelligence Services chief, or more commonly known MI6’s Ir Richard Moore, said Putin is “strung us.”
“He is trying to impose his empire at his freedom, but he cannot succeed,” Moore said. “Frankly, Putin bites more than he can bite. I thought he would win an easy victory, but he and many others underestimated the Ukrainians.”
Moore was speaking at the British Consulate in Istanbul five years later as head of MI6. He will leave the post at the end of September.
During his tenure, Russia began an invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. This is a war that has led to rage, with tens of thousands killed and enraged, mainly in eastern Ukraine.
Moore said the invasion strengthened Ukraine’s national identity, accelerated its westward trajectory, urged Sweden and Finland to join NATO.
“Putin tried to convince the world that Russia’s victory was inevitable. But he is lying. He lies to the world. He lies to his people. Perhaps he even lies to himself,” Moore told a news conference.
He said Putin “mortgages his country’s future for his own personal heritage and distorted versions of history,” and the war was to “accelerate this decline.”
Moore, who previously served as Ankara ambassador to the Turkish capital of Britain, added that “more power than Russia has failed to conquer weaker power than Ukraine.”
Analysts say Putin thinks that by long-lasting the political commitments of Ukrainian Western partners and exhausting Ukrainian small troops with a huge number, he can win a prolonged war of decline.
Meanwhile, Ukraine is competing to expand its defence cooperation with other countries and secure billions of dollars in investment in the domestic arms industry.
