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LAST UPDATE | 15 May
A RUSSIAN DELEGATION landed in Istanbul today for the first direct peace talks with Ukraine in more than three years – but without President Vladimir Putin despite many world leaders urging Russia’s leader to attend.
Putin was not included on a list of Moscow’s negotiating team published by the Kremlin late on Wednesday, after Zelenskyy challenged him to turn up in person to the talks.
US President Donald Trump said he was keeping open the possibility of travelling to Turkey tomorrow if there was any meaningful progress.
But the absence of Putin – as well as any top diplomats such as Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov or foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov – would seem to diminish the talks’ importance or any possibility of a breakthrough.
Low-level talks reportedly took place between Russian and Ukrainian officials but US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he did not see any progress being made unless Trump and Putin meet “face to face”.
“Our delegation is at the highest level – the ministry of foreign affairs, the office of the president, the military, our intelligence agencies… in order to make any decisions that can lead to just peace,” Zelenskyy said after landing in Ankara.
“We need to understand the level of the Russian delegation and what their mandate is, if they are capable of making any decisions themselves,” Zelenskyy said, adding that “from what we see, it looks more like a dummy”.
Zelenskyy met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara and Ukrainian officials have appeared to cast doubt on whether peace talks with Russia will take place today.
“If the president decides, the delegation will be there,” the official said, adding that it was “not unrealistic” to expect talks today, but that Zelenskyy would decide following his meeting with Erdogan.
That meeting ended at around 2.30pm Irish time and Zelenskyy has since left Turkey.
“Unfortunately, they are not taking the real negotiations very seriously,” Zelenskyy told reporters after a meeting with Erdogan.
But “out of respect” for Erdogan and Trump, Zelenskyy said earlier that he would still send a reduced delegation, led by Defence Minister Rustem Umerov, to Istanbul for the talks.
Meanwhile, Lavrov accused Zelenskyy of being “pathetic” for requesting Putin attend the talks.
“At first Zelenskyy made some kind of statements that demanded Putin come personally. Well, a pathetic person,” Lavrov said in a televised address to diplomats in Moscow.
Tens of thousands have been killed since Moscow invaded Ukraine in February 2022 in what is Europe’s worst conflict since World War II.
Russia now occupies about a fifth of Ukraine’s territory.
Russia’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters Moscow’s team was “ready for serious work”.
Hundreds of journalists are gathered at the Dolmabahce Palace in Istanbul, where the talks are rumoured to be taking place.
Trump has been pushing for a swift end to the three-year war but has become frustrated with a lack of progress and has encouraged the two sides to open direct talks.
“You know, if something happened, I’d go on Friday,” Trump said in Qatar.
He added of Putin: ”I don’t believe anything’s going to happen, whether you like it or not, until he and I get together.
“But we’re going to have to get it solved because too many people are dying.”
Asked if he was disappointed about the Russian level of attendance, Trump said: “I haven’t even checked.”
“Obviously he wasn’t going to go,” Trump said of Putin.
“He was going to go, but he thought I was going to go. He wasn’t going if I wasn’t there.”
Zelenskyy had spent days urging Putin to turn up after the Russian leader himself proposed direct Russia-Ukraine talks at the weekend.
Putin made the surprise call for negotiations after Kyiv and European leaders pressured him to agree to a full and unconditional 30-day ceasefire.
“This is his war… Therefore the negotiations should be with him,” Zelenskyy said in one statement.
Despite the flurry of diplomacy, Moscow and Kyiv’s positions remain far apart and there has been little sign that either are willing to make concessions.
The Kremlin’s naming of Vladimir Medinsky, a hardline aide to Putin and ex-culture minister, as its top negotiator suggests Moscow does not plan to make any concessions at the talks.
Medinsky, born in Soviet Ukraine, led the failed 2022 negotiations in which Moscow called for sweeping territorial claims and restrictions on Kyiv’s military.
He is known for writing ultra-nationalistic books and oversees teaching material for schools on Russian history that independent historians have denounced as a manipulation of facts.
Russia’s other three negotiators were named as Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin, Deputy Defence Minister Alexander Fomin and Igor Kostyukov, director of Russia’s GRU military intelligence agency.
Putin held a briefing with his negotiating team and Russia’s top foreign policy and defence officials in Moscow on Wednesday before they departed for Istanbul, the Kremlin said.
It did not provide details.
Russia insists the talks address what it calls the “root causes” of the conflict, including a “denazification” and demilitarisation of Ukraine.
These vague terms that Moscow has used to justify its invasion are widely rejected in Kyiv and the West.
It has also repeated that Ukraine must cede territory occupied by Russian troops and pull out of some areas still under Ukrainian control.
Kyiv is calling for an immediate 30-day ceasefire and says it will not recognise its territories as Russian.
But Zelenskyy has acknowledged that Ukraine might only get them back through diplomatic means.
NATO secretary general Mark Rutte said today he was “cautiously optimistic” about progress towards peace but that it was up to Russia to take the “necessary next steps”.
If the Russians “play ball… you could get to some breakthroughs over the next couple of weeks”, he said.
European leaders have said new sanctions will be quickly imposed on Russia if the Istanbul talks do not produce results.
Want to know more about what’s happening in Ukraine and why? Check out our FactCheck Knowledge Bank for essential reads and guides to finding good information online.
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