Ukraine has ‘two months to end war or face massive escalation’

Ukraine has two months to restart peace talks or risk Russia escalating the war, the Czech president has said. Petr Pavel warned that Vladimir Putin could declare a general mobilisation after elections set to be held on September 20. “I believe that the window is there for us to keep pushing and giving Russia a clear message that we are willing to start negotiations,” the retired general and former head of Nato’s military committee told The Telegraph. He added: “Russia will have parliamentary elections in September. President Putin will hardly declare mobilisation before, but once the elections are over, then the window will shrink.” Mobilisation would probably be deeply unpopular with voters. Mr Pavel said allies must use current pressure on Russia to force peace talks in the coming weeks. “Russia has a lot of internal problems and challenges at this point,” he said at the Nato summit. #nato #ukraine #russia ► Sign up to the Telegraph's free new daily newsletter, From the Editor, bringing you the latest news, features and analysis from the Telegraph newsroom: www.telegraph.co.uk/customer/secure/newsletter/from-the-editor/?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_youtube_telegraphmain ► Get the latest headlines: www.telegraph.co.uk?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_youtube_telegraphmain ► Stay ahead with a Telegraph digital subscription: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/customer/subscription/store?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_youtube_telegraphmain https://www.telegraph.co.uk/ and https://www.youtube.com/telegraph are websites of The Telegraph, the UK's best-selling quality daily newspaper providing news and analysis on UK and world events, business, sport, lifestyle and culture.