Istanbul (TDI): Delegations from Russia and Ukraine returned to the negotiating table in Istanbul on Wednesday, reviving efforts to seek an end to the conflict that has raged for over three years. However, hopes for a breakthrough remained low as both sides held firm to their opposing positions.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan opened the talks, calling for an end to the war, which he described as “bloody and costly.”
“Our goal is to stop this war and open a path toward peace,” Fidan told both delegations at the outset of the meeting.
Previous talks held in Istanbul in May and June yielded limited progress, restricted mostly to agreements on prisoner swaps and the return of fallen soldiers’ bodies. This latest round, while seen as a positive sign of continued dialogue, is not expected to lead to a major shift.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov tempered expectations ahead of the talks, saying, “No one thinks this will be easy. It’s going to be very tough.”
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A Ukrainian delegation member said Kyiv wants to focus on prisoner releases and possibly lay the groundwork for a direct meeting between President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to AFP.
“Whether any progress is made depends on Russia dropping its ultimatums and coming to the table with a constructive mindset,” the Ukrainian official said.
But Moscow has downplayed talk of a Putin-Zelensky meeting, insisting that the conditions are not yet in place. The last time the two leaders met was in 2019.
The two countries remain far apart on what a peace agreement might look like. Russia continues to demand that Ukraine withdraw from four regions that Moscow claimed to annex in 2022, a demand Kyiv has repeatedly dismissed as unacceptable.
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Ukraine maintains that it will not discuss territorial issues until after a ceasefire is in place. Ukrainian officials have also stated they will never accept Russia’s claim over any of its territory, including Crimea, which was annexed in 2014.
The full-scale invasion launched by Russia in February 2022 has devastated large parts of eastern and southern Ukraine, leaving tens of thousands of civilians and soldiers dead.
Ukraine’s delegation to the Istanbul talks is being led by Rustem Umerov, the country’s former defense minister and now Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council.
Russia’s team is headed by Vladimir Medinsky, a political figure who previously led the Kremlin’s negotiation efforts in past rounds. Medinsky is widely seen as having limited influence on actual policy decisions, and Ukrainian officials have dismissed him as little more than a figurehead.
At their last meetings in May and June, both sides agreed to major prisoner exchanges and exchanged early drafts of what a possible peace deal might look like. But Russian officials said afterward that the proposals remained “diametrically opposed.”
Farkhund Yousafzai is an Associate Editor at The Diplomatic Insight.
