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FromAndrew Apetz
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In secret talks between Moscow and the US, several Russian elites are said to have described the Ukraine war as a “mistake”. An insider reports.
Washington DC/Moscow – The fronts in the Ukraine war continue to harden, on both sides there are only minor advances despite heavy losses. While the Ukrainian counter-offensive has been dragging on for several months nowthey seem USA to work out a diplomatic solution. To do this, there should be direct, regular contact between Moscow and give Washington. The independent newspaper The Moscow Times spoke to an insider.
Russia and the US are said to hold secret talks on a regular basis
A former US official directly involved in talks between Russia and the United States alleged to have been involved The Moscow Timesthat there should be a secret exchange between the two states. Confidential sources have confirmed that there are online meetings between the states at least twice a month. Another former official confirmed that he visited Moscow at least every three months.
The aim of the talks is to gain “certain access to the Kremlin’s deliberations”. In order to better understand the other side and to avoid future conflicts, they exchanged information about each other’s red lines. So far, however, this has only been moderately successful. The biggest problem at the moment is that the Russian leadership itself doesn’t know what it wants.
“They cannot say what victory or defeat is for them. In fact, some high-ranking people who spoke to us made it clear that they never wanted this war and even called it a big mistake,” a US diplomat involved in the talks said. The only thing that is clear for Russia is that it is now in a war in which a “humiliating defeat” is not an option.
Russia will not cede any territories in the Ukraine war
Exclusively in the point around the occupied territories in the Ukraine had become clear to Russia. The Russian army currently holds areas in the east and south of the country, including large parts of the two self-proclaimed people’s republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, as well as the entire peninsula Crimea. In the secret talks, Russia made it clear that it had no intention of giving up its previous land gains, especially in Crimea. “If Russia thinks it could lose Crimea,” the ex-official said, “it would almost certainly resort to tactical nuclear weapons.” Before that US President Joe Biden also recently warned.
The offer of a fairer referendum in the occupied territories of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia, in which residents should vote on whether they want to be part of Ukraine or part of Russia, was rejected by Russia. The Russian leadership is said to have referred to the referendums that were held in September 2022. At that time, Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed the independence of the Ukrainian regions. The votes are still considered manipulated today.
‘Putin is the biggest obstacle’: deadlock in talks with Russia
Although the USA has been in regular contact with Russia for some time, they are currently in a communication dead end. “Russian politics is now all about the theater of war, which makes it impossible to engage in any productive form of diplomacy,” quoted The Moscow Times the insider. To make matters worse, Moscow is internationally isolated and is reluctant to make any overtures.
However, the problem lies not so much with the Russian leadership as a whole, but rather with the Russian President himself. “Putin is the greatest obstacle to any progress,” they say. The President has refused multiple attempts to communicate with the United States. That’s why, according to the former official, Washington should “start reaching out to and making headway with Russia’s anti-war elite.”
US denies secret communications with Russia
How much truth there is in the words of the former US official is unclear. In fact, the statements are in clear contrast to the official course of the Biden administration. The latter is pursuing the strategy of weakening Russia and using its potential for aggression large arms shipments to Ukraine to reduce.
The United States has not requested official or former officials to open a back channel, and is not seeking such a channel. Nor are we passing any messages through others.
When we say nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine, we mean it.
— Adrienne Watson (@NSC_Spox) July 27, 2023
After the report was published in the Moscow Times It was not long before the White House responded. National Security Council spokeswoman Adrienne Watson dismissed claims that the US had ordered current or former officials to open a secret communications channel to the Kremlin. She stressed that the US would also not transmit messages through third parties. Watson insisted that the statement “no talks without Ukraine” was to be taken literally and that it was being insisted on. (aa)
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