The Ukrainian president has a closed line of communication for direct communication with the leaders of other countries, which could be used to contact the president of the Russian Federation.

In the early days of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, attempts were made to use a closed telephone line to contact the Russian president, but the Kremlin did not return calls.

Mykhailo Podolyak, the adviser to the head of the President's Office, said this on Saturday, September 10, in the VIP programme of Natalia Moseychuk on the 1 + 1 channel as part of the telethon.

According to him, the President's Office was ready to have a direct telephone conversation at the beginning of the invasion of Russian troops into Ukraine, but all attempts were in vain.

“When the war starts, you definitely want to find out what is going on. But - no way. There was no connection. RF has not responded to any… There were attempts, this is a mandatory function; when a great state is attacking you, you have to find out whether this is really an attack, or they just, I say with irony, made a mistake with the border during the exercises," he said.

Mykhailo Podolyak suggested that the Russian Federation believed they had the second army in the world, which in three days would do everything they needed.

“There were no more attempts. It is pointless. Even today, it makes no sense. You can talk to a person who understands what he will say,” said the adviser to the chairman of the OP.

Podolyak also noted that there were no initiatives from the Kremlin to get in touch. Moreover, according to him, part of the political elite of Russia was shocked by the volume of war that Putin offered the world.

"They did not expect all this and were confused. I think that I knew a certain part - through the FSB, the Russian Guard, the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, they knew for sure and were preparing, but this is not the whole elite. There was a part of shocked people, at the Security Council of the Russian Federation it is clear that some of the people were in prostration .. They are still in prostration, realizing that their personal price [for the invasion] will be very high, including physical excesses,” he stressed.