The Prime Minister of Lithuania, Ingrida Šimonytė, has stated that Russian propaganda is trying to compare President Vladimir Putin's visit to the occupied territories of Ukraine with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy's trips across the contact line.

According to LRT, Šimonytė stated that Putin's visit is an attempt by Russian propaganda to "inspire" the unmotivated Russian occupying army.

She noted that aggressive Russian propaganda complicates the assessment of the truthfulness of Putin's visit to the occupied territories of the Kherson and Luhansk regions.

"It seems that there is an attempt to portray Vladimir Putin as somewhat similar to Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who goes to the front line, meets with soldiers close to the line of conflict, and thus demonstrates support for his troops and ordinary Ukrainians who are fighting in this war," said Šimonytė.

On 18 April, Russian propaganda media outlets reported that Russian dictator Vladimir Putin had allegedly visited the headquarters of the Dnepr military group on the Kherson front and the Vostok group in Luhansk region.

Previously, Josep Borrell, head of EU diplomacy, called on China (Ukr) to stop Putin to normalise relations with the EU.