Ukraine-Russia peace talks ended after less than two hours – here’s what we know

The first direct peace talks between Ukraine and Russia in more than three years didn’t exactly leave any reason to become more optimistic.

It finally happened

After more than three years, Russia and Ukraine has finally met in direct peace talks when two delegations met in Istanbul, Turkey on Friday.

No Zelenskyy or Putin

Neither Ukrainian President, Volodomyr Zelenskyy, or Russian President, Vladimir Putin, was present at the talks. Zelenskyy arrived in Turkey Thursday, but he wanted to meet Putin face to face. Putin did not go to Turkey.

The meeting happened

Nevertheless, a Russian and a Ukrainian delegation met today, Friday, for the first direct talks in three years – and the meeting is now over, lasting less than two hours.

What do we know?

According to Reuters, a Ukrainian source called the Russiand demands “non-starters”, showing no apparent sign of the two countries getting closer to an agreement for either a ceasefire or peace.

“Detached from reality”

The same source also told Reuters, that the Russian demands were “detached from reality and go far beyond anything that was previously discussed”, not specifying what that means.

No Russian words yet

At the time of writing this, no words have come from the Russian delegation, which is lead by the Russian Presidential Advisor, Vladimir Medinsky.

Hope continue to plummet

Even though Secretary General of NATO, Mark Rutte, Thursday said that he was “cautiously optimistic”, the short meeting and along with the statement from Ukraine show that any hope for a breakthrough is probably not going to come true.