Ukraine Wants Russia Expelled From U.N. as Putin Says He Would Negotiate

Ukraine is requesting the expulsion of Russia from the United Nations hours after Vladimir Putin said he was open to negotiations with "acceptable solutions."

Ukraine's Foreign Ministry published a letter Monday calling for Russia's removal from the U.N., as well as revoking its permanent member status on the U.N. Security Council, due to questions surrounding Russia's legitimacy following the fall of the Soviet Union in December 1991 that "left unresolved the issue of international rights and obligations of the USSR."

The Russian Federation took over the seat of a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council by bypassing the procedures defined by the U.N. charter, Ukraine claims, mentioning how the current charter does not contain the words "Russian Federation."

"The Russian Federation has never gone through the legal procedure to be admitted to membership and therefore illegally occupies the seat of the USSR in the U.N. Security Council," the letter reads. "From a legal and political point of view, there can be only one conclusion: Russia is a usurper of the Soviet Union's seat in the UN Security Council."

Officials also pointed to Russia's aggression toward Ukraine prior to the February 24 invasion, citing "eight years of armed aggression" that included the annexation of Crimea and ultimately led to the present bloody conflict that has been waged for over 10 months.

Further annexations in September in the Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk and Kherson regions of Ukraine, believed by Ukraine and Western allies to have occurred via sham referendums, have been deemed "a violation of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of Ukraine."

"The actions of the Russian Federation are contrary to the concept of a 'peace-loving' state," the letter continued. "Three decades of its illegal presence in the U.N. have been marked by wars and seizure of other countries' territories, forceful change of internationally recognized borders, and attempts to satisfy its invasive and neo-imperial ambitions."

Putin told Rossiya 1 state-television on Christmas Day that Kyiv, not Moscow, is at fault for a lack of engagement regarding a cease-fire.

"We are ready to negotiate with everyone involved about acceptable solutions, but that is up to them—we are not the ones refusing to negotiate, they are," Putin said.

Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warned the West that its continued involvement in the war will negatively affect the world economy.

He also said the West will have to ultimately involve itself in negotiations "whether it wants it or not."

"We will focus on those who have never let us down and with whom we have sometimes achieved very difficult compromises," Lavrov said, according to Russia's Tass news agency. "But when they were achieved, no one ever deceived anyone. With the West, everything is exactly the opposite."

Russia blaming the lack of negotiations on both Ukraine and the West is part of its history of deflection, retired U.S. General Mark Hertling said.

"Even in small things, RU officials don't negotiate...they demand, then they lie, and then they renege on agreements," Hertling tweeted Sunday.

Newsweek reached out to the U.N., Ukraine's Foreign Ministry and the Kremlin for comment.