Posted on 05/14/2025 11:51:24 AM PDT by marcusmaximus
ISTANBUL—Diplomatic brinkmanship over U.S.-brokered efforts to efforts to end Russia’s war in Ukraine reached dizzying levels on Wednesday, with each side seeking to call the other’s bluff by demonstrating a desire for peace and casting the other as the obstacle to it.
Ukraine’s president said he would be waiting in the Turkish capital, Ankara, on Thursday for Vladimir Putin, but the Russian president is sending a team of negotiators to Istanbul, and the Kremlin won’t say if he will be there.
President Trump hasn’t ruled out the possibility of joining any talks in Turkey, and senior U.S. officials are headed there, though it isn’t clear whom they will meet and when.
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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said he wants to meet the Russian leader to discuss an unconditional, 30-day cease-fire proposed by the U.S. that Kyiv agreed to in March, but Putin hasn’t so far endorsed.
Putin wants essentially a Ukrainian capitulation, even as Russian forces struggle to advance on the battlefield. He has portrayed the talks, which he proposed over the weekend, as a continuation of stalled negotiations from March 2022 in Istanbul. Those resulted in a draft document designed to neuter Ukraine.
According to Turkish and European officials, Putin is sending as the head of his delegation to Istanbul the same adviser who headed the Russian negotiating team back in 2022, former Culture Minister Vladimir Medinsky.
At that time, a much bigger part of Ukraine was under Russian occupation and Western heavy weapons hadn’t yet started to flow to Kyiv.
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
“Russian forces struggle to advance on the battlefield.”
Wow, the authors must be on drugs.
LOL !! 😂😂
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