Putin spurns Zelenskyy meeting but lower-level Ukraine-Russia talks are still on
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Source: AP
By MEHMET GUZEL, HANNA ARHIROVA and SUZAN FRASER
Updated 12:24 PM CDT, May 15, 2025
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Russia and Ukraine are set to hold their first direct peace talks in three years, both countries said Thursday, but hopes for a breakthrough remained dim after Russian President Vladimir Putin spurned an offer by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to meet face-to-face in Turkey.
Zelenskyy said he is sending a team headed by his defense minister from the Turkish capital Ankara to Istanbul to meet a Russian delegation, even though Moscow’s side doesn’t include “anyone who actually makes decisions.”
Few had expected Putin to show up in Turkey, and his absence punctured any hope of significant progress in efforts to end the 3-year-old war that was given a push in recent months by the Trump administration and Western European leaders. It also raised the prospect of intensified international sanctions on Russia that have been threatened by the West.
Zelenskyy, speaking to reporters in Ankara where he flew Thursday after challenging Putin to sit down with him, accused Moscow of not taking efforts to end the war seriously by sending a low-level negotiating team that he described as “a theater prop.”
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-istanbul-talks-zelenskyy-putin-05795eea960b9035f93a143c3e177c3d
= new reply since forum marked as read
Solution is simple: ruskies gtf out of Ukraine & pal ALL reparations for damages, including lives AND CHILDREN (35K) disappeared.
Fucking rusdia is and never has been anything but a pariah state.
🤣😂 
