Russian Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu said Thursday that the West faces a “choice”: either begin negotiations with Moscow over Ukraine or continue the “destruction” of its population.

Shoigu spoke a day after Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election, highly critical of US aid to kyiv, raising questions about long-term support for Ukraine.

Moscow has advanced rapidly on the battlefield in eastern Ukraine in recent months.

“Now that the situation in the fighting theater is not in kyiv’s favor, the West is faced with a choice: continue to finance (kyiv) and the destruction of the Ukrainian population or recognize the current realities and begin to negotiate,” said Shoigu, the Moscow spokesman. former defense minister, said.

He spoke at a meeting of a military alliance of former Soviet states.

Shoigu also said that “the collective West is losing its economic, political and moral leadership” and that Western hopes of a Russian defeat have “failed.”

Russia hopes that the West will tire of supporting Kyiv militarily.

The Kremlin said Wednesday it would judge Trump on his “actions” in the Ukraine conflict, with the Republican repeatedly promising a quick end to the conflict if he took office.

Trump blasted the billions of dollars in aid the United States has sent to Ukraine.

Shoigu was Russian defense minister during most of the Ukraine offensive, but was dismissed by President Vladimir Putin in May and replaced by economist Andrei Belousov.

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