US President Joe Biden mentioned Thursday that Russian chief Vladimir Putin’s order for a two-day Orthodox Christmas ceasefire in Ukraine was merely an effort to discover respiration room for his conflict effort.

“He was prepared to bomb hospitals and nurseries and church buildings” on December 25 and on New Year’s Day, Biden said, adding: “I think he’s trying to find some oxygen.”

State Department spokesman Ned Price known as Putin’s ceasefire “cynical,” saying, “We have little faith in the intentions behind this announcement.”

He voiced concern that Russia would use the break to “regroup, to relaxation and in the end to re-attack” and said that Putin may seek to “fool the world” by making it appear that he needs peace.

“This doesn’t seem to be a change within the tide of the conflict,” he said.

“If Russia were truly serious about peace, about ending this war, it would withdraw its forces from the sovereign territory of Ukraine.”

The United States additionally denounced the Wagner Group — a mercenary outfit shut to Putin that’s underneath US sanctions — for saying it had coordinated the discharge of a primary group of Russian inmates who accepted amnesty in return for combating in Ukraine.

Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin appeared in a video talking to a gathering of males — some injured and whose faces had been blurred.

“We would see it as only a barbaric tactic,” Price said, predicting that many prisoners would die on the frontlines.

“Even if there are tens of thousands of forces who may fall under Wagner’s control — under the control of Mr. Prigozhin — these are not forces that will be in a position to change the tide of war. These are not forces that are trained,” Price mentioned.

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(This story has not been edited by News18 employees and is revealed from a syndicated information company feed)