And the diplomats speak, and the guns are not silent
Kyiv and Moscow say they are moving towards a compromise amid continued hostilities

...
Against the backdrop of ongoing hostilities in Ukraine, Moscow and Kyiv signaled that negotiations were moving towards a compromise. The negotiators, who met three times in Belarus, now communicate online. According to Kommersant, the fourth full-time round is expected early next week. At the same time, both sides declare a possible contact between the presidents of Russia and Ukraine. Is there any hope for a speedy peace, Kommersant's special correspondent Vladimir Solovyov tried to find out in a conversation with Mikhail Podolyak, adviser to the head of the Ukrainian president's office, who is participating in the negotiation process.


Talk about negotiations

Against the backdrop of mutual accusations of Moscow and Kyiv of violating the rules of warfare and distorting information about the real situation in the combat zone, issues emerged on which the assessments of the belligerents suddenly coincided.

Thus, after negotiations with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron, a message appeared on the Kremlin website that Russian leader Vladimir Putin informed his interlocutors that a “series of negotiations” had taken place between the delegations of Russia and Ukraine in recent days.

Later, the press secretary of the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov explained that the negotiations, which were previously held in person (three rounds took place on February 28, March 3 and 7), were held in video format.

This information was later confirmed by the Ukrainian negotiator, adviser to the head of the office of the President of Ukraine Mikhail Podolyak. According to him, negotiations with the Russian delegation continue uninterrupted in video format. Also, he noted, working groups were created within the negotiation process. He did not decipher their specializations and functionality.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in turn, said that the talks were filled with substance. “A group of Ukrainians and Russian representatives are discussing certain other issues, they started talking about something, and not throwing ultimatums,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy told foreign journalists at a press conference (quoted by RIA Novosti).

Note that the Russian side has never officially stated that its requirements have been somehow adjusted. Until this happens, one should proceed from the fact that the Russian Federation continues to insist that Ukraine should be demilitarized, become a neutral country, recognize Crimea and the DPR and LPR within the administrative borders of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, and also “denazify” whatever is meant by this term.

Nevertheless, Vladimir Putin, who received Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko in the Kremlin that day, gave a similar assessment of the negotiation process to the Ukrainian one on Friday. He said: in the negotiations with Ukraine, "which are now held almost on a daily basis", "there are certain positive developments."

Mr. Putin did not explain what he meant. However, the press secretary of the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov said that now "no one excludes the possibility of a meeting between Putin and Zelensky." According to him, it is conceptually possible, but first the foreign ministers and delegations of negotiators of the two countries must do "their part of the work so that the presidents do not meet for the sake of the process and for the sake of conversation, but meet for the sake of the result."

To all appearances, contact has also been established between the Foreign Ministries of the Russian Federation and Ukraine.

The interlocutor of Kommersant, who was informed about the recent meeting in Antalya of the Foreign Ministers of Russia and Ukraine, Sergey Lavrov and Dmitry Kuleba, said that the meeting took place, albeit without breakthroughs, but correctly.

The nuance is important, given that the two ministers met in person for the first time, and earlier, during online negotiations in the Normandy format, now a thing of the past, they could hardly hide their mutual hostility.

Requests of Ukraine

Mikhail Podolyak, adviser to the head of the office of the President of Ukraine (part of the group of negotiators with Russia), shared some details of the negotiation process in an interview with Kommersant. In general, he gave him encouraging ratings.

“There are various proposals on the negotiating table now, there are a lot of them, there are a dozen proposals. Including the political settlement and, most importantly, the military settlement. I mean a ceasefire, a formula for a ceasefire and withdrawal of troops. Now all this is in conditional working groups, in legal formats it is being discussed what the final documents might look like, because they will then have to be initialed, signed, and so on. As soon as mutual legal formats are worked out, a meeting will be scheduled - the fourth round of negotiations. It could be tomorrow, the day after tomorrow. It's probably not necessary to go further and just have conversations. We discussed all the issues, we are now trying to pack these issues into some legal formats,” said Mr. Podolyak.

That is, the parties have begun to draw up agreements. They do not share specifics on this matter. Mikhail Podolyak makes a reservation: the delegations agreed not to comment on the content of the negotiations until the moment when all the key positions are agreed upon.

Mr. Podolyak described to Kommersant the parameters of the agreements that the Ukrainian side expects to reach. According to him, the agreement between Russia and Ukraine should be "multi-component".

How what is happening in Ukraine was perceived by Russia's allies in the region
“It should include several positions. First of all, the positions concerning the termination of the actual war as such. The second point is the procedure, the speed in terms of the time parameters for the withdrawal of Russian troops from the territory of Ukraine. The third part is a peace agreement. How the world will be guaranteed. And here we return to the key moment around which everything is built - guarantees of security for Ukraine so that such situations do not happen again, ”said the adviser to the head of the office of the President of Ukraine.

In the negotiations, according to Mykhailo Podolyak, one more - the fourth - component is being discussed: “This, of course, is a discussion of large-scale infrastructure destruction that exists throughout the country. In our country, unfortunately, despite all the statements that strikes are inflicted only on military infrastructure, strikes were inflicted very often and recently especially intensively against civilian infrastructure. It has been substantially destroyed, especially in the border regions, in part of the central regions. Accordingly, compensatory mechanisms should be clearly defined: at the expense of what and at the expense of what budget all this will be restored. These are, excuse me, the amounts in billions of dollars, if we take a preliminary estimate.

Ukraine expects compensation from Russia.

Russia, we note, rejects accusations of attacking civilian infrastructure. The Russian Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs have repeatedly stated that only military facilities are being attacked. At the same time, the departments have repeatedly stated that the Ukrainian security forces place weapons in residential areas of settlements and themselves fire at civilian objects. Kyiv, in turn, refutes this.

On the whole, according to the Ukrainian negotiator, the future compromise Russian-Ukrainian document should be comprehensive. It, Mikhail Podolyak explains, should include the impossibility of repeating hostilities against Ukraine, include security guarantees for it, and also “take into account those security guarantees that the Russian Federation also wants to receive, which has its own fears in relation to a number of global military alliances.”

Mykhailo Podolyak believes that the parties are approaching a compromise: “We have all the proposals that protect these interests in one way or another, take Ukraine out of harm’s way in order to prevent similar situations from happening again, put Ukraine in some kind of compensatory history in the right way. And I emphasize once again: the Russian side is already looking much more adequately (at the situation. - "Kommersant"). But some more time must pass so that they generally understand 100% the situation in which it is Russia, and not Ukraine, that has fallen.”

Counter courses

On March 10, the Ukrainian media published information about the conditions put forward by Russia. The publication Zerkalo Nedeli reported on six key points: the rejection of the movement to NATO and the neutral status of Ukraine, one of the guarantors of which should be Russia; the status of the second state for the Russian language; recognition by Ukraine of Crimea as part of Russia; recognition by Kiev of the independence of the DPR and LPR within the administrative boundaries of the regions; “denazification” of Ukraine, which implies a ban on the activities of ultranationalist, Nazi and neo-Nazi parties and public organizations, the abolition of laws on the glorification of Nazis and neo-Nazis, and, finally, the “demilitarization of Ukraine” - a complete rejection of offensive weapons.

Mikhail Podolyak was one of the first who immediately denied the information about the existence of such requirements.

In a conversation with Kommersant, he noted that the topic of "denazification" was no longer being discussed. According to him, this issue was raised by the Russian negotiators at the first meeting (there were three rounds of negotiations in total), but then the topic faded to nothing.

“Initially, the Russian delegation proceeded from the false premise that we have some kind of glorification of fascism, Nazism, and so on. In our country, as it turned out, and it was surprising for them, there are a number of European laws, which just spell out full-fledged prohibitions and condemnation of all manifestations of Nazism and fascism. It is absurd to present as a claim to the country something that we have already regulated at the legislative level in full in accordance with European charters.

He noted that the details of the discussed humanitarian blocks will be spelled out in the final communiqué: "And you will see that the picture looks different than it was originally presented in the media." “I think that literally another day or two and we will outline all this. I am in favor of not disclosing information that is not 100% confirmed in full. If these were some kind of trade conflicts or just diplomatic negotiations, then, perhaps, something could already be revealed from the point of view of informational interests. But the situation here is very difficult, because many countries (including Russia and Ukraine) will have to take on a number of obligations. And it is desirable to go to the end and get a full legally balanced package so as not to irritate anyone,” said Mr. Podolyak.

Answering the question whether the demilitarization of Ukraine remains on the negotiating table and in what context, Mykhailo Podolyak said that “there is a standard discussion of questions about how Ukraine will guarantee its security, including with its armed forces, in the future”: “ This is an absolutely pro-Ukrainian question. We want to have a full-fledged good army that will have a defensive defensive potential. We see that it is necessary in the modern world. And we will have political and military guarantees not to get into a situation where we are left face to face with major crises. I mean war related. Everything about such formulations as demilitarization sounds absurd. In fact, the wording will be much more adequate following the results of the negotiation process.”

Vladimir Putin approved sending foreign volunteers to the war zone

The final document (most likely, a peace agreement between Ukraine and Russia), according to Mr. Podolyak, will be signed by the presidents of the two countries. “You see that Volodymyr Zelensky is taking responsibility for all our defense initiatives, for running the state in wartime. He built what is essentially a full-fledged military office, which is very efficient and works almost around the clock. And of course, the President of Ukraine insists on bilateral negotiations between the Presidents of Russia and Ukraine, where they can finally agree on some mutual compromises, but from the point of view of Ukraine's interests, because Ukraine is the most affected country. Signatures, as I understand it, will be put by the presidents of Ukraine and Russia,” the negotiator suggested.

However, he believes that the participation of third countries may also be needed. “This is not just some small local conflict. Many countries are directly and indirectly involved in what is happening. They participate as informal, formal intermediaries, and actively accept sanctions packages. They are already providing direct or indirect assistance to Ukraine, holding constant consultations among themselves. These countries, which will solve the problem of reaching a peace agreement with Ukraine and Russia, are already 100% involved in this problem. There will be no need to somehow involve them additionally, to tell something. They can sit down at the negotiating table at any moment and literally join immediately in the final work, in the signing of the preliminary final document. I don’t see any problems here,” Mikhail Podolyak explained.

The Ukrainian negotiator sees the problem in something else - in further relations between the two countries. “It will be difficult to remove not some superficial component of media hatred, but rejection for many years,” Mikhail Podolyak concluded.

What happens after the entry of Russian troops into Ukraine. Day 17

Observers also say that the negotiation process is moving forward. “There has been some progress,” Vasily Kashin, director of the Center for Comprehensive European and International Studies at the National Research University Higher School of Economics, shared his observations with Kommersant. According to him, offensive operations in the Donbass and the blocking of Ukrainian "fortresses" in Kyiv, Kharkov, Chernigov, Sumy are taking place against the backdrop of an "active diplomatic struggle." “Judging by the leak in Zerkalo Nedeli, which I consider plausible, Russia does not set the ultimate goal of occupying territory outside the two regions. Consequently, the cities must be blocked in order to put pressure on the Ukrainians and prevent them from maneuvering forces. But it makes no sense to storm them as long as there is hope to squeeze the key Russian conditions into the negotiations,” Mr. Kashin believes.