After three years at war, the first direct conversations between the two countries begin this Thursday (15); The day before, Lula had already asked the Russian President to meet with Zelensky
A delegation from Russia came to this Thursday (15) for what can be the first direct conversations of peace with the in more than three years, but without the presence of the president . The Ukrainian President, he had challenged the Russian counterpart to participate, but Putin’s name was not included in a list of the trading team published by Kremlin on Wednesday.
Moscow representatives are “willing to conduct serious negotiations,” said Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Maria Zakharova. Hundreds of journalists were waiting on Thursday in front of the Dolmabahçe Palace, on the banks of Bosphorus. According to Russian diplomacy, meetings will start in the afternoon.
With the absence of Putin, Zelensky’s presence is not guaranteed either. The Ukrainian President’s plane set out on Thursday at noon in Ankara, the Turkish capital, for a meeting with his homologist Recep Tayyip Erdogan, according to a source of the Ukrainian government. “Only then will you decide the next steps of your schedule,” the source told AFP.
Ukraine has not communicated so far if the meeting with the Russians will happen, nor the exact composition of its delegation. In recent days, Zelensky has insisted Putin to participate directly in the negotiations, after more than three years of the Russian invasion of the Ukrainian territory in 2022, which left tens of thousands of dead.
Negotiations were announced by the Russian President last weekend, in response to an ultimatum from European and Ukraine countries, with the support of the United States, so that Russia would accept a ceasefire before starting to negotiate.
On Wednesday, Putin led a meeting “about the preparation of the next negotiations,” said Kremlin, with Foreign Minister Serguei Lavrov, Russian Army General Commander Valery GueraSimov and Federal Security Service Director (FSB), Alexandr Bortnikov, among others.
Cautiously optimistic
United States President Donald Trump, who presses Ukraine and Russia to negotiate, did not rule out traveling on Friday to Turkey, but only if there is advances in the conversations. Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, said Trump is “open” to “any mechanism” that can bring peace.
The Russian delegation is led by presidency counselor Vladimir Medinski, who is assisted by two deputy ministers, according to Kremlin. Medinski, born in the Soviet Ukraine and former Minister of Culture, participated in the first unsuccessful negotiations between Russians and Ukrainians in early 2022.
He is known for his nationalist positions about Russia, with several published books, questioned by many historians for his revisionism. Russian President Yuri Ushakov’s diplomatic advisor said the meeting will address “political” and “technical” issues. If they really happen, these will be the first direct peace conversations, without intermediaries, between Ukrainians and Russians since the failure of the first negotiations, shortly after the beginning of the conflict in February 2022.
But the two countries maintain difficult positions to reconcile. Russia requires Ukraine to renounce the NATO adherence process and the guarantee that it will maintain the Ukrainian territories attached by Moscow, unacceptable conditions for Kiev and their allies.
Ukraine, in turn, wants solid western “safety guarantees” to avoid new Russian attacks that the Moscow army, which controls almost 20% of the Ukrainian territory, withdraw from the country. Despite the difficulties, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said he is “cautiously optimistic” about a possible advance in negotiations.
*With information from AFP
