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Trump and Rubio Cast Doubt on Ukraine-Russia Peace Talks
Leading US diplomat Marco Rubio says he has low hopes for the peace negotiations between Ukraine and Russia that are scheduled to take place in Turkey and that progress would only be possible if Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin meet. “I don’t think we’re going to have a breakthrough here until President Trump and President Putin interact directly on this topic,” he stated following a NATO foreign ministers’ conference in southern Turkey earlier this year. Although Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged that Ukraine will send a delegation to the Istanbul negotiations, he criticized Moscow’s “low-level” group. Vladimir Medinsky, a presidential assistant and its leader, maintained that the Kremlin team possessed “all the necessary competencies.”
Earlier in the day, Trump – who is visiting the Middle East – also suggested that significant progress in peace talks was unlikely until he and Putin met in person.
Asked by the BBC on board Air Force One if he was disappointed by the level of the Russian delegation, he said: “Look, nothing’s going to happen until Putin and I get together”.
“He wasn’t going if I wasn’t there and I don’t believe anything’s going to happen, whether you like it or not, until he and I get together,” he added. “But we’re going to have to get it solved because too many people are dying.” Trump said he would attend talks in Turkey on Friday if it was “appropriate” but later said he would probably return to Washington.
Delegations from Turkey, the US, Ukraine and Russia had been due to meet in Istanbul on Thursday for the first face-to-face Ukraine-Russia talks since 2022. As of Thursday evening, no time for them to take place had been set. Some reports suggest they may now happen on Friday.
Vladimir Putin proposed direct talks on 15 May in Istanbul in response to a call by European leaders and Ukraine for a 30-day unconditional ceasefire.
Zelensky then challenged Putin to meet him in person, but on Thursday the Kremlin said that the Russian president was not among officials due to travel.
Zelensky Slams Russian Delegation as Peace Talks Resume in Istanbul Amid Ongoing Conflict
After a bilateral meeting with Erdogan in Ankara, Zelensky reaffirmed his challenge to meet with the Russian leader in person and accused Moscow of showing “disrespect” both Trump and Erdogan due to the inexperience of the Russian team.
“No time of the meeting, no agenda, no high-level of delegation – this is personal disrespect to Erdogan, to Trump,” he stated. Medinsky told reporters in Istanbul that Russia sees the talks as a “continuation” of the 2022 talks that were held shortly after Russia launched a full-scale invasion of its neighbor.
“The task of direct negotiations with the Ukrainian side is to sooner or later reach the establishment of long-term peace by eliminating the basic root causes of the conflict,” Medinsky stated.
Zelensky’s directive on Thursday states that Rustem Umerov, Ukraine’s defense minister, will lead the Ukrainian delegation. It will also comprise own foreign ministry, military general staff, and deputy heads of intelligence.
Medinsky, who led previous rounds of failed negotiations with Ukraine in 2022, will lead the Russian delegation, a statement from the Kremlin said. Russia’s deputy defence minister, deputy foreign minister and military intelligence head will also be there.
The Istanbul talks mark the first direct negotiations between Russia and Ukraine since the unsuccessful effort in 2022.
Russia has indicated it wants to pick up where they left off.
The terms under discussion included demands for Ukraine to become a neutral country, cut the size of its military and abandon NATO membership ambitions – conditions that Ukraine has repeatedly rejected as tantamount to capitulation.
Fighting in Ukraine rages on, with Russia saying its forces had captured two more villages in the eastern Dontesk region on Thursday.
Moscow now controls approximately 20% of Ukraine’s territory, including the southern Crimea peninsula it illegally annexed in 2014.
UK Defence Minister John Healey called on Ukraine’s allies to “put pressure on Putin”. Speaking after a meeting with German counterpart Boris Pistorius in Berlin on Thursday, Healey urged further sanctions on Russia “to bring him to the negotiating table”.
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