Ukraine does not rule out a neutral status debate. Russia also announced a change of course in negotiations with Ukraine.
- in the Ukraine conflict* diplomatic efforts continue. Now speak Russia* of “progress” in the negotiations with the Ukraine*.
- The President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy*requires talks at presidential level with Wladimir Putin*.
- You can read all the news and information about the negotiations between Russia and Ukraine in the news ticker.
Update from 03/10/2022, 03:10: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan stressed Turkey’s mediating role ahead of the first face-to-face meeting of foreign ministers of Russia and Ukraine since the Russian attack on the neighboring country began. Turkey is still able to talk “both with Ukraine and with Russia,” Erdogan emphasized on Wednesday (March 9, 2022). However, Ukraine and a Western representative expressed pessimism about the prospects for the meeting.
The meeting on Thursday (March 10, 2022) in Antalya is about “preventing the crisis from developing into a tragedy,” emphasized Erdogan.
Talks between Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who arrived in Antalya on Wednesday, and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba are scheduled to start in Antalya on Thursday around 9:30 to 10:00 a.m. local time (7:30 to 8:00 a.m. CET). They are accompanied by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu.
Ukraine-Russia negotiations: Zelenskyj calls for direct talks with Putin
+++ 6.25 p.m.: Chancellor Olaf Scholz spoke to Russian President Vladimir Putin on the phone about the war in Ukraine. The top politicians discussed “political-diplomatic efforts” to resolve the conflict, the Kremlin said in Moscow. The Federal Press Office in Berlin confirmed the call. The Kremlin also announced that Putin had also spoken to Scholz about Russia’s negotiations with Ukraine. Nothing was communicated from the German side about the content.
+++ 3.45 p.m.: In the Ukraine war there is great hope that negotiations will sooner or later lead to peace. The first official talks at government level between the two warring parties since the invasion of Russian troops are now scheduled for Thursday (March 10, 2022) in Antalya, Turkey.
However, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba does not believe in a breakthrough ahead of the meeting with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov. “I’ll tell you quite frankly that I have low expectations for the negotiations,” Kuleba said in a video clip published on Facebook. “But we will undoubtedly exert maximum pressure,” emphasized Kuleba. Kuleba said he hoped that Lavrov actually wanted to find a solution on how to end the war – “and not for propaganda reasons”.
Update from Wednesday, March 9th, 2022, 2:45 p.m.: Chancellor Olaf Scholz has called on Vladimir Putin to end the Ukraine war immediately. “My appeal to the Russian President is: stop the bloodshed, withdraw the Russian troops,” said Scholz at a joint press conference with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Berlin. “It is a terrible catastrophe for the Ukrainian people, but the Russian people are also suffering from this war.” The Russian attack on Ukraine was “a blatant breach of international law and the world we live in is not the same now,” said Scholz, who spoke of a “turning point for Europe”.
Hopes for peace are currently resting primarily on negotiations between Russia and Ukraine. While Volodymyr Zelenskyy is hoping for a meeting with Putin at presidential level, the first official talks at government level since February 24 between the two foreign ministers are scheduled for Thursday (March 10, 2022) (see initial report).
Ukraine war: Foreign ministers meet in Turkey for talks
First report from Wednesday, March 9th, 2022: Moscow – The Ukraine war continues unabated, more than two million people have now fled the country. The calls for new negotiations between the two warring parties are getting louder. Now a meeting between Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and his Ukrainian colleague Dmytro Kuleba, scheduled for Thursday (March 10, 2022), gives a little bit of new hope for an end to the war.
“As for the meeting of foreign ministers, it is a continuation of the negotiation process, which is very important,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. Kuleba and Lavrov want to meet in Antalya, Turkey – it would be the highest-ranking conversation since the beginning of the war.
Russia is also interested in further rounds of talks with Ukrainian representatives, emphasized Peskov, who again pointed out two core Russian demands: the recognition of the Ukrainian Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, annexed in 2014, as Russian territory and the independence of the self-proclaimed eastern Ukrainian “People’s Republics” of Donetsk and Luhansk.
War in Ukraine: Negotiations on escape corridors continue
In the past two weeks, a Russian and a Ukrainian delegation have already met three times in the Belarusian border region for negotiations. Escape corridors for civilians were agreed, but their implementation has repeatedly failed in the end.
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told journalists in Moscow that another round would focus primarily on escape corridors for civilians. She also pointed out that Russia is not seeking to overthrow the Ukrainian government. “Some progress has been made in the negotiations with Ukraine,” said Zakharova. The Russian troops are not tasked with “overthrowing the current government”.
Ukraine war: Zelenskyj calls for direct negotiations with Putin
Meanwhile, Ukraine has not ruled out discussing the country’s possible neutrality in negotiations with Russia. “Such questions could be discussed in negotiations, that is quite possible,” said Volodymyr Zelenskyj’s foreign policy adviser Ihor Showkwa in the ARD daily topics. At the same time, he called for Zelenskyy to have direct talks with Vladimir Putin.
Showkwa campaigned for a presidential-level meeting. He emphasized that serious negotiations would only be possible if the Russian President met Zelenskyy. Selenskyj is ready for this. Unfortunately, the Russian side is not willing to do this. However, such negotiations and a possible agreement could only come about when the hostilities had ceased and there was a ceasefire.
Ukraine war: Negotiations on neutrality conceivable
Then one could discuss “what it could look like with a possible neutrality of Ukraine,” said Showkwa. “We therefore need strict guarantees so that such a situation can never occur again,” he added. “We are not the aggressors, we will never be the aggressors.” Since 2019, the goal of joining NATO has been laid down in the Ukrainian constitution. Russia is demanding that Ukraine renounce this and declare itself neutral. (cs with dpa/AFP) *fr.de is an offer from IPPEN.MEDIA.
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