A key ally of Vladimir Putin has urged Ukraine and Russia to negotiate an end to the conflict, as Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his country’s troops had captured a key Russian town.

The president of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, made the comments in a wide-ranging interview with Russian state television amid Ukraine‘s ongoing incursion on Russia‘s border that started on 6 August.

Mr Lukashenko said only “high-ranking people of American origin” wanted the Ukraine-Russia war to continue.

The West, he added, was encouraging Kyiv to fight because it wants Ukraine and Russia to “destroy each other”.

The Belarusian president also said – without providing evidence – that Kyiv could have plans to attack Belarus, and said that Minsk would not allow Ukrainian troops to “trample on our country”.

The Ukrainian military did not respond to the claims.

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Mr Lukashenko has positioned himself as a main backer of Mr Putin since the Russian president ordered the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, part of which was staged from Belarusian soil.

Moscow has said any peace talks should be based on Ukraine ceding land amounting to a fifth of its territory – much of it seized by Russian forces.

Ukraine says Kyiv would be prepared for talks provided Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity were fully respected.

Mr Lukashenko’s comments come as Mr Zelenskyy said Ukraine’s military had taken full control of Sudzha. It is the largest Russian town to fall to Ukraine since the start of their cross-border incursion.

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Although it had a pre-war population of around 5,000 people, Sudzha is the administrative centre for the border area of Russia’s Kursk region and is larger than any of the other towns or settlements that Ukraine says it has taken since the incursion began.

Mr Zelenskyy said Ukraine was setting up a military command office in the town, which suggests that Ukraine might plan to remain in the Kursk region long-term – or just signal Moscow that it may intend to do so.

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Kyiv also said its forces have advanced 35km (22 miles) into Russia since last week and continue to gain ground. It marks the first time foreign troops have invaded and held Russian territory since Nazi Germany did in World War Two.

Ukraine has also taken more than 100 Russian soldiers prisoner during their invasion of the Kursk region, Mr Zelenskyy said on Wednesday.

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Moscow did not immediately respond to Mr Zelenskyy’s latest claims, but its defence ministry said earlier on Thursday that Russian forces had blocked Ukrainian attempts to take several other communities.

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Russia also said it would beef up border defences as more than 120,000 people were ordered to evacuate the western Kursk region.

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