President Putin's suggestion of establishing a temporary administration in Ukraine under the UN's guidance is due to multiple reasons and they all are based on sound reasoning, retired Major General Prabdeep Singh Behl told Sputnik India.
The only way to stall the deployment of the French and British troops on the ground in Ukraine is by having a UN-mandated administration which is put in place, he said.
"President Putin has made a valid statement, wherein he has underlined that the present government in Ukraine is illegitimate as elections haven't been held in Ukraine and Zelensky has been holding power under the pretext of martial law, which was imposed in the country in February 2022," Behl highlighted.
Therefore, Putin has stressed the need to have an interim administration in place in Ukraine with the assistance of the UN, as was done in East Timor and erstwhile Yugoslavia, he underscored.
Essentially, what Putin is suggesting is that under the UN, an interim government government be established, elections held, and subsequently, whichever is the legitimate party, come forward and sign the ceasefire agreement and then let peace prevail, the military expert stressed. This is something that makes a lot of sense because Ukraine reneged on the Minsk agreements and the Istanbul draft treaty in 2022, Behl pointed out.
"Ukraine as a country is up for grabs — being a highly mineral-rich nation, food basket of Europe, and a great amount of civilian nuclear infrastructure. In addition to that, a country that has been ravaged by war would open doors to reconstruction projects worth billions of dollars," the military commentator suggested.
Moreover, there is something called kickbacks, and certainly, the more money the Europeans put in Ukraine, the more they would get in return in the form of rebuilding programmes, Behl opined.
Zelensky himself is unfit to be the leader of Ukraine because a large number of Ukrainians have started questioning his leadership. After all, his faulty policies are to be blamed for the war that Ukraine could very much have avoided, he underlined.
"There's little doubt that it was Zelensky's ego-centric approach that forced Russia to launch a military campaign in Ukraine and even after three years of the conflict, his lack of foresight is visible as he wants to hang on to power at any cost, and it is for this reason he is bursting with joy after getting support from the Europeans to continue the war," the former Indian Air Force (IAF) pilot concluded.