President (Vladimir Putin) said that this needs to be done as quickly as possible. (It will take) as much time as is necessary to save the maximum number of lives of our military and civilians. But there is no doubt that the Kursk region will be liberated fairly soon.
The data from our military shows that our troops have been successfully progressing in the Kursk region as they liberate those areas that have been controlled by [Ukrainian] militants.
Negotiators are flying in and indeed contacts are scheduled.
Putin gave a firm order to kick our group out of there by May 9, and if this does not happen, then for him it will really be a very serious ideological defeat.