Negotiations between Russia and Ukraine began in Belarus on Monday, the first talks between the two countries since the start of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, according to the Belarusian state news agency BELTA.
The Kremlin adviser Vladimir Medinski chairs the Russian delegation, while that of Kiev is led by the Ukrainian Minister of Defense Oleksiï Reznikov, who came in khaki military uniform.
“You can feel completely safe,” declared the head of Belarusian diplomacy, Vladimir Makeï, welcoming them.
Through the voice of its spokesperson Dmitri Peskov, the Kremlin declared that it did not want to “announce” its position during these negotiations which “must be done in silence”.
For Kiev, “the key issue is an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of (Russian) troops from Ukrainian territory,” the Ukrainian presidency said on Monday.
The talks are being held at one of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko’s residences on the Ukrainian-Belarusian border, in the Gomel region, not far from the damaged Chernobyl nuclear power plant, which is on Ukrainian territory.
They take place while the Russian offensive, launched on February 24, comes up against the resistance of the Ukrainian army and sanctions of an unprecedented scale, adopted by the West, shake the Russian economy.
To see in video