Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has claimed Vladimir Putin “doesn’t have too much time left” as questions continue to swirl over the whereabouts of the Kremlin leader and his recent disappearance from the public eye.

The 73-year-old Russian leader has not been seen in person for over a week, with his last public appearance recorded on February 5. While Russian state media has broadcast footage of the leader meeting officials in recent days, these are widely believed to be pre-recorded clips used to mask his absence.

It remains unclear whether Putin’s apparent absence is due to health issues or other reasons, but Zelensky told Politico at the Munich Security Conference: “I’m younger than Putin…”

When the audience laughed, the 48-year-old Ukrainian leader said: “No, no, believe me this is important. He doesn’t have too much time, you know. Not too much time. He has, God bless, not too much time.”

The Ukrainian leader further criticised his rival as a “slave to war,” drawing comparisons between the current invasion and the 1938 Munich Agreement. The comments follow a period of relative silence from the Kremlin, which has previously cultivated a reputation for allowing Putin to vanish for secret medical treatments.

Evidence of the leader’s potential physical decline surfaced recently during a meeting with a Russian health chair. Footage showed Putin’s right hand appearing with visible bulging veins and thin skin, while the leader seemed to nervously clench his fingers under his sleeve.

The mystery surrounding the Kremlin coincides with a bombshell report from a group of European leaders on the death of dissident Alexei Navalny. Foreign ministries from the UK, France, and Germany have stated that samples taken from Navalny “conclusively confirmed” the presence of epibatidine—a neurotoxin found in the skin of South American dart frogs.

British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper called Putin a “murderer” who must be held accountable, stating that the Russian state demonstrated “despicable tools” to silence political opposition.

Despite the pressure and the ongoing attacks on Ukraine’s energy grid, Zelensky remains defiant. “He may see himself as a tsar,” he told the conference, “but in reality, he is a slave to war.”

It came as Donald Trump called on Zelensky to make concessions to Putin, insisting Russia is seeking a peace deal as its full-scale invasion of Ukraine approaches its fifth year. The US president told reporters at the White House on Friday: “Russia wants to make a deal and Zelensky’s going to have to get moving.”

Trump continued: “Otherwise, he’s going to miss a great opportunity. He’s going to have to move.”

Russia is still demanding that Ukraine cede territory in Donbas, which Putin’s forces have failed to seize during the war – a condition Kyiv refuses to accept ahead of new peace talks in Geneva next week. Zelensky hit back at the suggestion, saying Ukraine, unlike Russia, has already made concessions – the largest being that Putin has not been jailed for war crimes. “We have made a lot of compromises,” he told Politico. “Putin and his friends – they are not in prison. This is the biggest compromise the world made already.”

The Kremlin has reinstated hardline aide Vladimir Medinsky as the key negotiator for the Geneva talks, replacing GRU military intelligence chief Admiral Igor Kostyukov. The US also urged China to intervene, claiming it would take only a phone call to halt the conflict. “China could call Vladimir Putin and end this war tomorrow,” said US Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker.

Meanwhile, Russian forces launched an overnight attack on Ukraine on Saturday. The body of a 76-year-old woman was found under the rubble of a building in Odesa.

“Overnight, the enemy once again attacked the region with strike drones. In Odesa, a UAV hit damaged the roof of a single-story residential building. Firefighters quickly extinguished the blaze. Unfortunately, a woman was killed in the attack,” said Odesa regional military chief Oleh Kiper.

A barrage on the Zaporizhzhia region in the past 24 hours also killed at least one person and wounded three others, according to regional military chief Ivan Fedorov.