Kremlin Continues ‘Blowing Smoke’ Over Istanbul Meeting

As hopes that the “big dogs,” Trump and Putin, may yet turn up for tomorrow’s peace talks in Istanbul that the Russian president asked for on May 11 look increasingly unlikely, some of Moscow’s main mouthpieces are still being coy about who will go and what will be discussed.

Yuriy Ushakov, described as a foreign policy advisor to Russian leader Vladimir Putin and who was part of Russia’s delegation for talks with the US in Riyadh in February, was asked by Pavel Zarubin, a reporter from Russia’s VGTRK news outlet on Wednesday about the composition of tomorrow’s Russian delegation.

He answered that this would depend on the agenda, which he said would need to address a wide variety of political and technical issues.

“The delegation needs to address both political and, I’d say, a billion technical issues. So, the composition of the delegation will be determined based on that,” he said.

Asked when the Istanbul meeting would begin, he said: “I’ve been thinking about that since early morning,” before suggesting that Moscow would propose that the talks should take the aborted 2022 agreement, which “were suspended by the Ukrainian side,” as its starting point.

Asked if he would be part of the delegation, Ushakov said “I work here,” before heading off for the meeting between Putin and Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim.

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In a Sky News interview, Volodymyr Zelensky said he would accept freezing the war along current front lines as the quickest path to a ceasefire, while stressing it must lead to diplomacy. However, Moscow has instead insisted that any settlement would require Ukraine to surrender the entire Donetsk region.

Ushakov’s reference to the 2022 talks was echoed by Rodion Miroshnik, who is the Russian Foreign Ministry’s so-called “special envoy for crimes committed by the Kyiv regime” during a visit to Bishkek the capital of Kyrgyzstan on Wednesday.

He said: “The text agreed in Istanbul in 2022 by representatives of Russia and Ukraine may serve as an option of conflict settlement, provided it is adjusted for the events that have taken place over the past three years… and after that we will move to signing this document. Let it be an option for conflict resolution.”

On Wednesday evening, the Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also declined to expand on what would be discussed and by whom. The Russian news outlet Vedemosti cited him as saying that this would be governed by the issues that were raised during the meeting in Turkey:

“We need to wait for them to start. No one will say in advance what the starting points will be,” he said during his daily press briefing before adding, “We will make an announcement as soon as the president thinks fit.”

On May 11 Putin, in response to Western calls for a 30-day ceasefire, which he declined, instead offered to start negotiations with Kyiv “without preliminary conditions.” Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov told TASS that Moscow expects to engage directly with Ukraine in Istanbul: “Our representatives are getting prepared for this contact.”