Moscow, March 28, (dpa/GNA) – The Kremlin says face-to-face peace negotiations between delegations from Ukraine and Russia, could take place in Istanbul on Tuesday.
“Today they will probably not continue there,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Monday, according to the Interfax agency. “We expect that, theoretically, it could happen tomorrow.”
The head of the Russian delegation, Vladimir Medinsky, had said that a new round of face-to-face meetings was planned to start on Tuesday, after about two weeks of online negotiations. The Ukrainian side initially spoke of a start to the negotiations as early as Monday.
Later, the newspaper Ukrayinska Pravda, citing its own sources, reported that the delegations would travel to Istanbul on Monday, but would not begin talks until Tuesday.
According to Peskov, a face-to-face meeting would allow for more substantive negotiations than a video link. However, Peskov also said: “So far, unfortunately, we can’t foresee any significant successes or breakthroughs.”
In more than a month of the war, negotiators from Ukraine and Russia have met three times in the border region of Belarus. Talks then shifted online. On Sunday, the Turkish presidential office named Istanbul the venue for the next talks.
Kiev wants a withdrawal of Russian troops and security guarantees. Moscow is demanding that Ukraine renounce NATO, that the breakaway eastern Ukrainian separatist regions be recognized as separate states, and that the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, annexed in 2014, be recognized as part of Russia.
Source: Ghana News Agency