The first direct Russian-Ukrainian dialogue in the last three years yielded good results, said late last night President Vladimir Putin's special envoy for investment Kirill Dmitriev, quoted by Reuters, TASS and BTA.
"Good results from the first dialogue between Russia and Ukraine in three years: the largest exchange of prisoners of war, working options for a ceasefire, understanding of positions and continuation of the dialogue", said Dmitriev, who is the head of the Russian sovereign wealth fund and one of the most familiar with the US representatives of the Russian elite, in a publication in Ex.
He added that all this would not have been possible without the US president, Vice President J.D. Vance, Steve Witkoff, Marco Rubio and other members of Donald's team Trump.
Yesterday, negotiations between Russia and Ukraine took place in Istanbul. As part of the discussions, Moscow and Kiev agreed to exchange prisoners of war according to the formula "1000 for 1000", to present in detail their vision of a possible future ceasefire, and also to continue the negotiations. The head of the Russian delegation, presidential aide Vladimir Medinsky, said that Russia was satisfied with the results of the meeting, TASS notes.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, who led the Kiev delegation, specified that the exchange of prisoners of war would take place "in the near future", DPA indicates.
However, after the talks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky expressed regret that, in his words, they had become a missed opportunity for peace.
"This week, a real chance opened up before us to make progress towards ending the war – "if Putin had not threatened him to come to Turkey," the Ukrainian leader wrote in Aix on the sidelines of the European Political Community (EPC) summit in Albania.
Zelensky indicated that he was "ready to meet Putin personally to resolve all key issues", but the Russian president did not agree to anything.
Late last week, the Ukrainian leader publicly called on his Russian counterpart to meet with him in Istanbul. Putin did not respond and instead sent a lower-level delegation for talks in Turkey.
During the talks in Tirana, Zelensky said that Kiev's allies should impose new sanctions if Moscow does not accept an unconditional ceasefire.