Russia makes the continuation of peace talks conditional on concessions by Kyiv. According to sources, he is demanding that Ukraine give up part of its territory in exchange for a ceasefire.
Russian officials are seeing less and less reason to continue U.S.-led peace talks with Ukraine unless Kiev indicates it is ready to cede territory as part of a ceasefire deal, Bloomberg News reported Saturday, citing sources familiar with the matter. TASR informs about it according to a Reuters report.
Talks between Moscow and Kiev, scheduled for next week, will be key to determining whether the two sides can move toward an agreement to end the war, the report said. The Kremlin on Friday confirmed plans for new trilateral talks to end the war in Ukraine, following separate talks with US envoys in Geneva this week. Ukraine previously announced that new talks would be held in early March in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
Direct negotiations between Kyiv and Moscow, mediated by Washington, have recently stalled, the DPA agency notes. Both sides of the war accuse each other of wanting to win on the battlefield instead of settling at the negotiating table. The main Russian demand is for Ukraine to give up even those parts of its territory that Moscow has not yet occupied, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy refuses.
