Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov attends a meeting at the Konstantinovsky Palace. Vladimir Smirnov/KREMLIN/dpa
DPA: Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has reaffirmed Russia's claim to Ukrainian territories.
He said it was a fact that a significant part of Ukraine wanted to become Russia and had already become Russia.
He spoke of "four new regions of Russia," reiterating Moscow's claims to the eastern and south-eastern Ukrainian regions of Kherson, Donetsk, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhya, which Russian troops have only partially occupied during the three-year war to date.
Peskov's comments come after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Monday that he is expecting a high-level US delegation to arrive in Kiev this week.
US President Donald Trump is pushing for an end to the war but recently linked continued aid for Ukraine to access to raw materials.
Zelensky has made it clear that he could show his gratitude for Western military aid in the form of rare earth metals and other natural resources.
Moscow also annexed the Ukrainian Black Sea peninsula of Crimea back in 2014 and currently controls almost a fifth of Ukraine's territory.
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