a false truce

Vladimir Putin's announcement to open a 36-hour truce to celebrate Orthodox Christmas on January 6 and 7 reveals his double face as military and political leader.

The protection of the traditions of the faith is intended to issue a humanitarian message without being able to hide the cynicism of a unilateral decision (again) immediately rejected by the authorities of the invaded country.

A spokesman for Volodimir Zelensky has been very explicit: the only possible truce is the withdrawal of the territory occupied militarily and annexed by Putin after the holding of four (false) referendums.

The truce proposal possibly reveals something more of Putin's strategy by underestimating the perception that the European Union and the West have of a war without justification and that they have massively condemned.

Putin's gesture could not be more myopic before an international community that does not accept unilateral annexations and by the brutal force of arms.

In reality, what Putin is demanding is that Ukraine declare a ceasefire so that Orthodox Christmas can be celebrated on the front lines without risk to his own troops.

kyiv will have no choice but to abide by that decision even though the propaganda nature of Putin's move is evident.

A truce is only such when there is an agreement between the opposing parties and the guarantee of neutral arbitration.

What Putin has come to demand is that Ukraine declare a ceasefire so that Orthodox Christmas can be celebrated on the front lines without risk to his own troops.

kyiv will have no choice but to abide by that decision even though the propaganda nature of Putin's move is evident.

A truce is only such when there is an agreement between the opposing parties and the guarantee of neutral arbitration.

What Putin has come to demand is that Ukraine declare a ceasefire so that Orthodox Christmas can be celebrated on the front lines without risk to his own troops.

kyiv will have no choice but to abide by that decision even though the propaganda nature of Putin's move is evident.

A truce is only such when there is an agreement between the opposing parties and the guarantee of neutral arbitration.

Putin has supported the temporary ceasefire at the request of the patriarch of the Orthodox Church, Kiril.

The role of the highest religious authority in Russia has not been exemplary in this case either, rather it is openly reprehensible.

It was Kirill himself who encouraged the Russian troops to finish off the Ukrainians in the first moments of the invasion and invoked God's propitious help.

The ecclesiastical authorities —and the Spanish have memories of some of them— too many times have been wrong to identify the political cause that best embodies the justice, charity and piety of their pastoral messages.

And Kiril is the best example, after the Orthodox Church experienced its most serious schism in 2018, when kyiv obtained emancipation from the Patriarchate of Constantinople from Moscow's guardianship and control.

Kiril betrays his inability to adapt to the new reality by addressing his request for a truce "to all the parties involved in the internal conflict", as if there were not two States facing each other on the battlefield and, by the way, two churches with their respective heads. and without dependence on each other for five years.

The Ukrainian denunciation of being before a Russian propaganda operation does not seem misguided when the bombings and waves of missiles against civilian targets and Ukrainian infrastructures have been in recent days, and on the eve of the same Orthodox Christmas that Putin wants to protect today, particularly brutal and inconsistent with the theoretical pious inspiration of a false truce.

as if there were not two States facing each other on the battlefield and, by the way, two churches with their respective heads and without dependence on each other for five years.

The Ukrainian denunciation of being before a Russian propaganda operation does not seem misguided when the bombings and waves of missiles against civilian targets and Ukrainian infrastructures have been in recent days, and on the eve of the same Orthodox Christmas that Putin wants to protect today, particularly brutal and inconsistent with the theoretical pious inspiration of a false truce.

as if there were not two States facing each other on the battlefield and, by the way, two churches with their respective heads and without dependence on each other for five years.

The Ukrainian denunciation of being before a Russian propaganda operation does not seem misguided when the bombings and waves of missiles against civilian targets and Ukrainian infrastructures have been in recent days, and on the eve of the same Orthodox Christmas that Putin wants to protect today, particularly brutal and inconsistent with the theoretical pious inspiration of a false truce.