Urged on by US President Donald Trump, Moscow and Kyiv have opened direct negotiations for the first time since the early weeks of Russia’s invasion but have yet to make significant progress towards an elusive agreement.
At the first round of talks in Istanbul last month, they agreed a large-scale prisoner exchange and to swap notes on what their vision of a peace deal might look like.
Russia says it will present a “memorandum” of its peace terms, having resisted pressure by Ukraine to send its demands in advance.
Outlining Kyiv’s position ahead of the talks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky refreshed his call for an immediate halt to the fighting.
He also called for the sides to discuss a direct meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The Kremlin has repeatedly pushed back on that prospect, saying a Putin-Zelensky meeting could only happen after the negotiating delegations reach wider “agreements”.
Moscow says it wants to address the “root causes” of the conflict -- language typically used to refer to a mix of sweeping demands including limiting Ukraine’s military, banning the country from joining NATO and massive territorial concessions.
Tens of thousands have been killed since Russia invaded, with swathes of eastern and southern Ukraine destroyed and millions forced to flee their homes.
Russia’s top negotiator in Istanbul will be Vladimir Medinsky, an ideological Putin aide who led failed talks in 2022, has written school textbooks justifying the invasion and questioned Ukraine’s right to exist.
“Diplomatic advisors” from Germany, France and Britain will be “on the ground... in close coordination with the Ukrainian negotiating team,“ a German government spokesperson said Sunday.
Kyiv’s security service said the plan, 18 months in the making, had involved smuggling drones into Russia which were then launched from near the airbases, thousands of kilometres away from the front lines.
Ballistic strikes in the northeastern Kharkiv region on Monday injured at least six people, including a seven-year-old, and damaged a civilian business and a warehouse, Kharkiv Governor Oleg Synegubov said on Monday.
Ukraine has pushed Russia to agree a full, unconditional and immediate ceasefire -- saying a pause in the fighting is necessary to then discuss what a long-term settlement could look like.
It also wants concrete Western-backed security guarantees -- like NATO protections or Western troops on the ground -- that have also been ruled out by Russia.
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