ISTANBUL – A Russian delegation landed in Istanbul on Thursday for the first direct peace talks with Ukraine in more than three years — but without President Vladimir Putin despite many world leaders urging Russia’s leader to attend. Putin was not included on a list of Moscow’s negotiating team published by the Kremlin late on Wednesday, after Zelensky challenged him to turn up in person at the talks. US President Donald Trump said he was keeping open the possibility of travelling to Turkey on Friday if there was any meaningful progress. But the absence of Putin — as well as any top diplomats such as Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov or foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov — would seem to diminish the talks’ importance or any possibility of a breakthrough.
Tens of thousands have been killed since Moscow invaded Ukraine in February 2022 in what is Europe’s worst conflict since World War II. Russia now occupies about a fifth of Ukraine’s territory. Russia’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters Moscow’s team was “ready for serious work”.
A Ukrainian official told AFP that Zelensky was en route to Ankara, where he will meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and only then would decide his approach to the talks. “The president starts his visit with Erdogan in Ankara and only then will the president decide on the next steps,” the official said. Hundreds of journalists were gathered at the Dolmabahce Palace in Istanbul, where the talks are rumoured to be taking place, AFP reporters saw.
Trump has been pushing for a swift end to the three-year war but has become frustrated with a lack of progress and has encouraged the two sides to open direct talks.
“You know, if something happened, I’d go on Friday,” Trump said in Qatar.
Speaking at a NATO meeting in Antalya, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington was “impatient” for progress and willing to consider “any mechanism” to achieve a lasting end to the war.
Rubio is due in Istanbul on Friday “for meetings with European counterparts to discuss the conflict in Ukraine and other regional issues of mutual concern”, the US State Department said.
Zelensky had spent days urging Putin to turn up after the Russian leader himself proposed direct Russia-Ukraine talks at the weekend.
Putin made the surprise call for negotiations after Kyiv and European leaders pressured him to agree to a full and unconditional 30-day ceasefire.
“This is his war… Therefore the negotiations should be with him,” Zelensky said in one statement.
Despite the flurry of diplomacy, Moscow and Kyiv’s positions remain far apart and there has been little sign that either are willing to make concessions.
The Kremlin’s naming of Vladimir Medinsky, a hardline aide to Putin and ex-culture minister, as its top negotiator suggests Moscow does not plan to make any concessions at the talks.
Medinsky, born in Soviet Ukraine, led the failed 2022 negotiations in which Moscow called for sweeping territorial claims and restrictions on Kyiv’s military.
He is known for writing ultra-nationalistic books and oversees teaching material for schools on Russian history that independent historians have denounced as a manipulation of facts.
Russia’s other three negotiators were named as Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin, Deputy Defence Minister Alexander Fomin and Igor Kostyukov, director of Russia’s GRU military intelligence agency.
Ukraine has not named its delegation. Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga is in Antalya for the NATO gathering.
Putin held a briefing with his negotiating team and Russia’s top foreign policy and defence officials in Moscow on Wednesday before they departed for Istanbul, the Kremlin said.
It did not provide details.
Russia insists the talks address what it calls the “root causes” of the conflict, including a “denazification” and demilitarisation of Ukraine.
These vague terms that Moscow has used to justify its invasion are widely rejected in Kyiv and the West.
It has also repeated that Ukraine must cede territory occupied by Russian troops and pull out of some areas still under Ukrainian control.
Kyiv is calling for an immediate 30-day ceasefire and says it will not recognise its territories as Russian.
But Zelensky has acknowledged that Ukraine might only get them back through diplomatic means.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said on Thursday he was “cautiously optimistic” about progress towards peace but that it was up to Russia to take the “necessary next steps”.
If the Russians “play ball… you could get to some breakthroughs over the next couple of weeks”, he said.
European leaders have said new sanctions will be quickly imposed on Russia if the Istanbul talks do not produce results.
