ISTANBUL: In response to Kyiv’s challenge to visit Turkey in person to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Russian President Vladimir Putin dispatched a second-tier team of aides and deputy ministers on Thursday to hold peace talks with Ukraine.
The chances for the discussions, which would be the first since the early weeks of the war, were thrown into disarray by Putin’s absence. Turkey stated that no meeting was yet set, while Russia stated that they will take place in Istanbul in the second half of the day.
Zelenskiy called the Russian lineup, which does not include Putin, his foreign minister, or his top foreign policy adviser, “decorative” as he arrived in the Turkish city of Ankara. He stated that following his meeting with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, Ukraine would determine its next course of action in the negotiations with Russia.
