Since peace negotiations with Russia did not bring tangible results this year, they have now been stopped.
Deputy Foreign Minister of Ukraine Sergei Kislitsa, who oversaw the negotiation process on behalf of the country’s President Vladimir Zelensky, spoke about this in an interview with The Times newspaper.
According to him, since the summer the main task has been to get more decisive actions from Ukraine’s international partners and force the presidents to meet face to face person.
As a Foreign Ministry representative said, at the negotiations in Istanbul, which took place on May 16, June 2 and July 23, the Russians brought a dossier on each member of the Ukrainian delegation.
“They know very well the past of each of us and sometimes say provocative and rather unpleasant things,” he said. This approach was aimed at distracting and angering the Ukrainian delegates, so that they could then blame them for the breakdown of the negotiations.
Vladimir Putin chose historian Vladimir Medinsky as his lead negotiator, who began the negotiations with a lecture, distorting the history of Ukraine and Russia.
According to him, the Russians repeatedly ignored all attempts to talk on the merits. Instead, they suggested setting up WhatsApp groups, working groups and other mechanisms they could use to reassure the Americans that negotiations were going well and thus deter them from imposing punitive measures.
He said the Russians refused to consider any kind of ceasefire until he asked what they even meant by that word. The only truce that the Russian delegation agreed to was a two-hour ceasefire to evacuate the bodies of the dead.