MOSCOW, July 12. /TASS/. The situation in Ukraine has not improved over Vladimir Zelensky’s presidency, instead, it has somewhat degraded, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in his new article, On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians, that was posted on the Kremlin website on Monday.

He drew attention to the fact that the Western authors of the project for turning Ukraine against Russia are setting up the Ukrainian political system in such a way that even if the presidents, deputies or ministers in this country change, the attitude toward separation and enmity with Russia remains unchanged.

"The key election slogan of the incumbent [Ukrainian] president was the establishment of peace. He came to power on it," Putin recalled. "These promises have turned out to be lies. Nothing has changed. Moreover, the situation in Ukraine and around Donbass has somewhat degraded."

"There is no place for sovereign Ukraine in the ‘anti-Russian’ project, and neither for the political forces that are trying to defend its real independence," the president said. "Those, who talk about reconciliation in Ukrainian society, about a dialogue, about finding a way out of the deadlock, are labeled as ‘pro-Russian agents’".

Moscow, in his words, is aware of the tricks used to picture Ukraine as Russia’s antipode. "And we will never let anyone use our historical territories and our kin living there to be used against Russia. And I would like to tell those, who will try to do it, that they would only ruin their country this way," he emphasized.

He drew attention to the fact that Ukraine’s authorities are in the habit of citing Western experience as a role model. "But look how Austria and Germany, the United States and Canada are living side by side," he said, adding that these are close in terms of ethnic composition, culture, language but they are sovereign nations "with their own interests and own foreign policy."

"They have quite conditional, transparent borders, and people feel at home crossing them. They make families, study, work, run businesses. By the way, like millions of natives of Ukraine, who are now living in Russia. For us, they are our kin," Putin pledged.