the state RIA Novosti news agency this morning.
"I can say that any contacts are useful, but, unfortunately, we do not see a constructive approach from the American side aimed at concrete results."
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has emerged as one of the key brokers between Russia on the one side and Ukraine and the West on the other since the start of the war in February.
He played an important role in convincing Mr Putin to resume participation in the UN-brokered Black Sea grain deal last month after a drone attack on a Russian naval base in Russian-annexed Crimea, according to diplomats.
While Moscow and Washington publicly cast each other as major threats to global stability, they have contacts on a variety of levels.
Russian statement 'hints at Moscow's current aims in war'
In the latest daily update on the war from the UK's ministry of defence, comments made by Kremlin spokesman Dimitry Peskov are the focus.
The ministry says the remarks indicate Moscow still plans to increase its control over four Ukrainian regions Russia has declared its own - but casts doubt over its ability to do so.
"Peskov's comments suggest that Russia’s current minimum political objectives of the war remain unchanged," the ministry says.
"Russia is likely still aiming to extend control over all of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson Oblasts. Russian military planners likely still aim to prioritise advancing deeper into Donetsk Oblast.
"However, Russia's strategy is currently unlikely to achieve its objectives: it is highly unlikely that the Russian military is currently able to generate an effective striking force capable of retaking these areas.
"Russian ground forces are unlikely to make operationally significant advances within the next several months."
like this, Ukraine will become a failed state, a black hole that will have to be patched up."
He said that Russian businessmen, including the so-called oligarchs who amassed huge fortunes after the fall of the Soviet Union, no longer considered London to be a safe haven.
"No one now would consider the United Kingdom to be a safe haven; it turned out to be a pirate haven," he said.
International team of legal advisers working with Kherson prosecutors for probe into alleged sex crimes by Russian forces
An international team of legal advisers has been working with local prosecutors in Ukraine's recaptured city of Kherson in recent days as they began gathering evidence of alleged sexual crimes by Russian forces as part of a full-scale investigation.
The visit by a team from Global Rights Compliance, an international legal practice headquartered in The Hague, has not previously been reported.
Their efforts are part of a broader international effort to support overwhelmed Ukrainian authorities as they seek to hold Russians accountable for crimes they allegedly committed during the conflict, now nearly 10 months old.
Accusations surfaced soon after Russia's 24 February invasion of rape and other abuses across the country, according to accounts Reuters gathered and the UN investigative body.
Moscow has denied committing war crimes or targeting civilians, and the Kremlin denies allegations of sexual violence by the Russian military in Ukraine.
Erdogan and Putin discuss grain supplies and potential regional gas hub in Turkey
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed grain supplies and a potential regional gas hub in Turkey today, both countries said.
Relations with NATO member Turkey are vital to Russia at a time when the West has hit it with waves of economic sanctions, which Mr Erdogan's country has refrained from joining.
Turkey has, however, rejected Russia's move to annex four Ukrainian regions as a "grave violation" of international law.
Turkey has acted as a mediator with the United Nations on an agreement that guarantees grain exports from both Ukraine and Russia, two of the world's biggest producers.
"President Erdogan expressed his sincere wish for the termination of the Russia-Ukraine war as soon as possible," the Turkish presidency said on Sunday.
In the call, Mr Erdogan said Ankara and Moscow could start work on exporting other food products and commodities through the Black Sea grain corridor, the Turkish president's office said.
Russia has urged the United Nations to push the West to lift some sanctions to ensure Moscow can freely export its fertiliser and agricultural products - a part of the Black Sea grain deal that Moscow says has not been implemented.
"The deal is of complex character, which requires the removal of obstacles for the relevant supplies from Russia in order to meet the demands of the countries most in need," the Kremlin said in a statement.
The Kremlin said the two also discussed an initiative to create a base in Turkey for exports of Russian natural gas.
Electricity 'gradually returning to Odesa', region's governor says
Electricity is "gradually returning" to Odesa after a night strike by 15 Iranian drones left 1.5 million people without power, the region's governor has said.
Maksym Marchenko added: "As of now, electricity is gradually returning to Odesa and the communities of the Odesa district. Of the 1.5 million residents who were without electricity yesterday, this number has decreased to 300,000 households today.
"We also expect a significant improvement in the situation tomorrow."
In his nightly address President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said of the drone attack: "This is the true attitude of Russia towards Odesa, towards Odesa residents – deliberate bullying, deliberate attempt to bring disaster to the city.
"Our sky defenders managed to shoot down 10 drones out of 15."
"It is not just me... people are not blind and deaf at all: people at the mid-level there do not even hide their views which, how do I put it, are not fully complimentary about the president or the defence minister," Mr Girkin said.
Russia's defence ministry did not comment on the remarks from Mr Girkin who has repeatedly criticised Mr Shoigu, a close Putin ally, for the battlefield defeats Russia has suffered in the war.
Putin and our other representatives constantly kept saying this," the TASS news agency quoted Peskov as saying.
"But this was all ignored by the other participants of the negotiation process.
"This is all precisely the precursor to the special military operation."
Mr Putin was asked on Friday about remarks by former German Chancellor Angela Merkel, one of the agreements' sponsors, who told the Zeit magazine in an interview published on Wednesday that the 2014 agreement had been "an attempt to give Ukraine time" - which it had used to become more able to defend itself.
Russian media and politicians have quickly construed this as a betrayal on Ms Merkel's part.
drone strikes.
After an almost six-month blockade caused by the invasion, three Ukrainian Black Sea ports in the Odesa region were unblocked at the end of July under a deal between Moscow and Kyiv brokered by the United Nations and Turkey.
Grain exports from Ukraine in the first eight days of December fell 47.6% from a year earlier to 1.09 million tonnes, agriculture ministry data showed.
Peace talks cannot be a 'fig leaf' for Russian rearmament, foreign secretary says
Any peace talks in Ukraine cannot be a "fig leaf" for rearmament, British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly has told Sky News.
He added that he had not seen any signs Moscow would enter into negotiations in good faith.
Cleverly said that, while Britain wanted to see peace talks "sooner rather than later", he reiterated that Ukraine should set the parameters for any negotiations that were held.
"Any negotiations need to be real, they need to be meaningful, they can't just be a fig leaf for Russian rearmament and further recruitment of soldiers," Mr Cleverly told Sky News.
"I'm not really seeing anything coming from the Russian side that gives me confidence that Vladimir Putin is entering these talks in good faith.
"The wider rhetoric is still very confrontational."
It comes days after Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow would likely have to reach agreements about Ukraine in the future.