Erdogan advocates a ceasefire and believes negotiations will facilitate a face-to-face meeting between Zelenski and Putin

Istanbul is the new venue for negotiations between Ukraine and Russia. The Turkish capital has hosted the fifth round of talks since Russia decided more than a month ago to attack the Ukrainian country through a military invasion. Thus, a Ukrainian and a Russian delegation have met again in order to pave the way for a possible ceasefire at a time when Russian attacks on Ukraine have not ceased, but they have changed their strategy after declaring that they would only dedicate themselves to "liberating the Donbas area".

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has argued that a ceasefire agreement would pave the way for a face-to-face meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymir Zelenski and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, something that has not been ruled out but which, in the words of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, must be "well prepared".

Before the meeting began, the Ukrainian foreign minister, Dymtro Kuleba, warned and advised his colleagues to avoid drinking and eating during the negotiations in order to avoid possible poisoning. In recent days we have learned that members of the Ukrainian delegation have suffered signs of poisoning, as well as the Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, who has tried to mediate in the conflict.

On the sidelines of the meeting at the Dolmabahce Palace, Erdogan said that Turkey "has witnessed a lot of suffering in the region" and that they have worked "to try to avoid a similar scenario in the northern Black Sea. We believe there will be no losers in a just peace. Prolonging the conflict is in nobody's interest," he said in a televised speech.

Similarly, the Turkish president was optimistic that "there will be no losers in a just peace. Prolonging the conflict is not in anyone's interest", which is why Erdogan advocates a ceasefire. So much so that he has stated that he "hopes that these meetings will be beneficial for both countries and for the region", in order to put an end to a conflict that "worries" the Turkish country. For the Turkish leader, the time has come for the ceasefire to cease "as soon as possible. The whole world is waiting for good news from you", he stressed. 

This is the second time that Turkey has hosted the Russian-Ukrainian talks. The city of Antalya was the first Turkish city to stage the face-to-face meeting between Russian and Ukrainian foreign ministers Sergei Lavrov and Dymtro Kuleba. So far, these meetings have been characterised by a slow pace and little progress, something Erdogan hopes will change in order to "stop this tragedy".

Turkey was precisely the country in which Russia rejected a ceasefire, as well as the creation of a humanitarian corridor in the city of Mariupol, one of the enclaves that is suffering the most from this conflict and where the civilian population is experiencing one of the most extreme situations due to the scarcity of food, as a result of being under siege.

Along with Turkey, Belarus has been one of the other countries that has been the scene of these peace negotiations, a country where Ukraine initially refused to go because of its direct aid to Moscow in its invasion strategy. 

However, unlike Belarus, Turkey has openly stated that it would not be mediating directly in the negotiations, but it does facilitate understanding between the two, offering its country for the development of these negotiations and good understanding.

Erdogan made it clear that Turkey would not mediate directly after announcing that he was leaving for a trip to Uzbekistan, but leaving Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavasoglu in the country. "We do not intend to mediate in the negotiations, but we will mediate", he concluded.

These negotiations will last three days, according to one of the members of the Ukrainian delegation, David Arahamiya. After Zelenski learned of the duration of this new meeting, he expressed his willingness to talk about the status of neutrality of the Turkish state in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. 

However, the Ukrainian leader made it clear that it will only be possible to reach an agreement with Russia as long as the latter commits to the total withdrawal of its troops. He also refused to put on the table the concepts of "denazification" and "demilitarisation" of which Russia accuses them.

Alongside this, Zelensky stressed his desire to reach a compromise on the Donbas area. "Let's go back to before this started and try to resolve the complex issue of Donbas," he said.

The Donbas issue is not the only party with which Zelensky has been more open to a possible dialogue. The Ukrainian leader has stated that "it is impossible" to force Moscow to completely leave the country, as this could lead to a Third World War.

All this comes at a time when Ukrainian intelligence has claimed that Russia is trying to split the country in two in order to create a sort of "North Korea", and after Russia has continued to attack with missiles infrastructures in the city of Lviv, a city located 80 kilometres from the border with Poland, while US President Joe Biden was in Warsaw.