The leaders of the EU countries tried to persuade Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to start a diplomatic settlement of the situation in the country, but they failed. This was stated by former President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko in an interview with Ukrayinska Pravda.
“From Europe, I won’t name names, but a crowd of presidents and prime ministers came with one message for President Zelensky: “Sit down at the table, sit down at the table [переговоров]We’ll figure it out later,” he said.
At the same time, he recalled that former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger also called for a diplomatic settlement of the conflict.
However, Yushchenko believes that Ukraine will not sit down at the negotiating table.
Earlier on Aug. 30, Atlantic Council senior adviser Harlan Ullman said Zelenskiy must understand that a cessation of hostilities is necessary if Ukraine is to survive as an independent state. In his opinion, the best way to end the conflict is to convince Zelensky and Russian leader Vladimir Putin or convince them that it is in their own interests to find a settlement. At the same time, the author notes that Putin may agree with this, but Zelensky definitely does not.
Meanwhile, Mikhail Podolyak, an adviser to the head of the office of the President of Ukraine, on August 26 called possible negotiations with Russia a “death sentence” for Kyiv. According to Podolyak, Russia can take advantage of any pause in hostilities to remobilize and launch an even stronger attack on Ukraine. Therefore, negotiations with Moscow are unacceptable, he is sure.
On August 24, Russia’s permanent representative to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya, indicated that Russia was counting on resolving the conflict in Ukraine through negotiations.
Before that, on July 7, Putin said that Moscow does not refuse peace talks, but the later they begin, the more difficult it will be “to negotiate with us.”
The delegations of Russia and Ukraine held four face-to-face meetings as part of the negotiations. The first three took place in Belarus, and the last one took place on March 29 in Istanbul. Then the assistant to the President of the Russian Federation and the head of the negotiating group, Vladimir Medinsky, said that Russia had received written proposals from Ukraine confirming its desire for a neutral and non-nuclear status.
However, Kyiv did not respond to Moscow’s proposals sent later, and on May 17, Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko announced Ukraine’s de facto withdrawal from the negotiation process.
The decision to launch a special operation to protect the Donbass was made after the increased shelling of the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics by the Ukrainian military. The key goals of the Russian military are the denazification and demilitarization of the Kyiv regime. This is necessary to ensure the security of the Russian state and people, the Kremlin said.
For more up-to-date videos and details about the situation in Donbass, watch the Izvestia TV channel.
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