Moscow not expecting ‘breakthroughs’ from Ukraine talks

MOSCOW - Moscow on July 22 once again downplayed expectations for a third round of peace talks with Ukraine and did not confirm the date for a meeting in Istanbul set for July 23 by Ukraine.

That came after the Kremlin said on July 21 that

the two sides were far apart in their visions

on how to end the more than three-year-old conflict, and as they continued to pummel each other with drones and missiles.

“We don’t have any reason to hope for some miraculous breakthroughs,” Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said at a regular briefing in answer to AFP’s question about the Kremlin’s expectations from the talks.

Outlining potential topics for discussion, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that Kyiv was ready to “secure the release of our people from captivity and return abducted children, to stop the killings, and to prepare a leaders’ meeting”.

Moscow said that “a lot of work lies ahead” before even discussions could take place about possible talks between Mr Putin and Mr Zelensky, who last met in 2019.

Ukraine said its ex-defence minister and current secretary of the security council, Mr Rustem Umerov, will head Kyiv’s delegation for the talks on July 23.

But the Kremlin said only that it hoped talks could be held “this week”.

“As soon as we are ready, we will make an announcement regarding the dates,” Mr Peskov said.

Moscow’s delegation at the last round of talks with Ukraine was led by a hawkish historian and the current head of the Russian Union of Writers, Mr Vladimir Medinsky, whom Ukraine described as a puppet with no authority.

Ukrainian and Russian delegations met in Istanbul on May 16 and June 2 as Washington stepped up pressure for a deal, but no breakthroughs were made and the talks only

yielded agreements to exchange prisoners

and soldiers’ bodies.

Five killed in strikes

At the front line, far from the diplomatic deliberations, the brutal conflict raged on, with Moscow and Kyiv saying that they had intercepted dozens of drones launched at each other.

The Russian army said that it had captured the village of Novotoretskoye in the Donetsk region – the latest advance as Moscow intensifies its ground offensive.

A Ukrainian drone strike on a private bus in the Russian-occupied part of the Kherson region killed three people and wounded another three, a Moscow-installed official said.

Another man died in Russia’s western border Belgorod region after a Ukrainian attack, according to the local governor.

At the same time, a Russian drone and missile salvo on Ukraine killed a 10-year-old boy in the eastern front-line city of Kramatorsk and wounded more than a dozen people across the country, Kyiv’s authorities said.

In recent weeks, Russia has fired a record number of drones and missiles at Ukrainian cities as well as seized more front-line territory, which Kyiv says is evidence that Moscow is not serious about halting the all-out offensive that it launched in February 2022. AFP