Ukraine and Russia will hold a first meeting on Monday to seek a negotiated solution to the war conflict, reported the Ukrainian Deputy Minister of the Interior, Evgeny Yenin, in an unspecified place between the border of his country and Belarus.
The information about this first contact between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations, which breaks with the intention of not giving information about this meeting, was put in the mouth of Jenin by the American chain CNN.
The office of the President of Ukraine, Volidimir Zelensky, reported that although the proposal that the meeting will be held in Belarus, in the city of Gomelit was agreed to transfer it to a place on the border, which will be kept secret.
“Politicians agreed that the Ukrainian delegation will meet the Russian delegation without preconditions at the border between Ukraine and Belarus, near the Pripyat River”said his office, as reported by the AFP agency.
Zelensky agreed to this negotiating meeting after having a telephone conversation with his Belarusian counterpart, Alexandr Lukashenko, in which he obtained guarantees that Belarus will not join the invasion launched by Russia early on Thursday.
“Alexsandr Lukashenko has taken responsibility for ensuring that all planes, helicopters and missiles stationed on Belarusian territory remain on the ground during the trip, meeting and return of the Ukrainian delegation,” added the office of the Ukrainian Presidency.
Prior to defining that the meeting will be in a place on the border, Zelensky proposed, during the conversation with Lukashenko, to do it in Poland, Slovakia, Hungary or Azerbaijan, or in Istanbul, Turkey.
The reticence of the Ukrainian government was explained by the denunciation that it also made of the launch of missiles from Belarus against their territory.
“That’s where the Iskander (missiles) launched around 5 pm from Belarus ended up that I wrote about half an hour ago. Russian-Belarusian fascists are attacking the Zhytomyr airport”, north central of the country, the ministry adviser wrote on Telegram. of the Interior of Kiev, Anton Gerashenko.
The Iskander is a Russian ground-transportable, cruise-type, short-range missile that is capable of carrying nuclear warheads.
In the middle, Russian President Vladimir Putin had accused Ukraine of missing an opportunity to negotiate.
Last Thursday, four days ago, Putin ordered a full-scale invasion of Ukraine that cost the lives of around 200 civilians and drew international condemnation and sanctions against Moscow.
Moscow wants the surrender of the Ukrainian forces and depose its pro-Western government so that the territory is “neutral”, conditions considered unacceptable by Kiev.
Zelensky made public his lack of confidence in which the meeting of both delegations resulted.
“Frankly, as always, I don’t believe much in the outcome of this meeting, but let them try”he claimed.
However, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dimitro Kuleba considered against the grain of his president’s reluctance that the mere holding of talks with Russia is a “great victory”, after what he described as a failed Russian invasion from the country.
“Let no one interpret these talks in terms of what we are willing to accept. First, Russia did not want to talk. Later, when they have started losing lives, and after the failure of their lightning offensive, they began to speak with the language of the ultimatum,” Kuleba explained, quoted by the Europa Press agency.
“Now, having suffered one defeat after another, they tell us that they just want to talk. Therefore, the fact that talks are going to take place without preconditions is already a victory for Ukraine,” added the Ukrainian minister, who ratified the position that Ukraine will neither abandon nor cede its territory
“Let’s not capitulate, we will not give up even an inch of territory, it is not the objective of our struggle”, emphasized.
Thus, after several days of attacks in Ukraine and the failure of previous negotiation attempts, the Russian and Ukrainian authorities finally reached an agreement to start a dialogue to try to put an end to the escalation of war that arose after the Russian invasion last Thursday and recognition of the independence of the self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Lugansk.
The end of the initiative, stressed the Russian president, is to reduce the war capacity of Ukraine and end Nazism which was established in Ukraine.
Putin promised that those responsible for the numerous war crimes against the civilian population of Donetsk and Lugansk they will appear before the courts and called on the Ukrainian soldiers not to comply with the “criminal” orders of the authorities, lay down their arms and return to their homes.
In a harsh message, the Russian president stressed that his country would respond immediately and forcefully to any external force that gets in its way, in a veiled allusion to the member countries of NATO.
