Zelenskyy's Office Believes Russia Uses Talks for Propaganda, Not Peace
Russia sees any negotiation process solely as a platform for promoting its ultimatums and propaganda messages, not as an opportunity to achieve peace. And after the meeting of the delegations in Istanbul, it got the minimum from a propaganda point of view, said Mykhailo Podolyak, advisor to the head of the Office of the President of Ukraine.
The Gaze reports on this with reference to the broadcast of the FREEDOM TV channel.
"Any negotiations in which Russia is still involved, it sees solely as a way to get an additional propaganda platform to discuss and push its ultimatum demands, which have nothing to do with reality. I'm talking about Russia's territorial claims, subjective claims, as well as its claims to a military component in Ukraine," the advisor to the Presidential Administration noted.
He recalled that Russia itself proposed the meeting in Istanbul and defiantly sent a delegation there without decision-making authority.
"Of course, understanding the structure of governance in Russia, there is no point in saying that a negotiating group can conduct real negotiations if Putin is not present. Russia tried to use this situation in its propaganda interests, but it failed. We heard statements from our European partners, the Turkish side, and the American side, as a global mediator. They all said that the negotiations were not at the level they had expected, not with the results that could have been expected. And, of course, this is the fault of the Russian side alone," said Mykhailo Podolyak.
The Advisor to the Head of the Office of the President stressed that Ukraine's position is to start any negotiations with two key aspects: an unconditional ceasefire and the exchange of prisoners under the ‘all for all’ formula.
"In principle, Russia got the minimum from these negotiations from a propaganda point of view. Ukraine got a solution to a key and important humanitarian aspect. Let me remind you that we believe that any negotiations should start from two positions. The first is an unconditional ceasefire. This is what opens up the possibility for truly productive negotiations. And the second is the exchange of ‘all for all’. The word ‘all’ means civilians, prisoners of war, and, of course, deported children taken by Russia from the occupied territory of Ukraine. And at this meeting in Turkey, it was decided to carry out an exchange based on the ‘1000 for 1000’ formula," the speaker said.
For the first time, Russia is taking back such a large number of its prisoners of war and is ready to give away a thousand Ukrainian boys and girls for the simple reason that all these Russian prisoners of war, many of them, give interviews about how bloody this war is, how ruthless Putin is towards Russian citizens, Podolyak said.
"Taking more of their prisoners is precisely the Russian Federation's calculation for a domestic propaganda platform. To prevent the testimonies of Russian prisoners of war from appearing and causing, to put it mildly, confusion in the minds of Putin's adherents, Russian citizens who are still ready to sign a contract and go to die in the war against Ukraine," the guest said.
The negotiation process itself is aimed at trying to exert propaganda influence on foreign markets, Podolyak said.
"Russia's imitation negotiation initiatives are aimed at delaying the process and reducing the amount of sanctions pressure. Of course, Russia will not conduct real negotiations without coercion," the guest concluded.
On 16 May, direct talks between Ukraine and Russia took place in Istanbul. The first round of discussions lasted two hours. The talks will continue after each side outlines its vision of a possible ceasefire.
As The Gaze reported earlier, during the talks in Istanbul, Ukraine and Russia agreed to exchange prisoners in the format of "1000 for 1000".