Zelenskyy to travel to Turkey for peace conversations regardless of Putin’s plans

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Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has pledged to travel to Turkey regardless of Vladimir Putin’s plans, increasing the stakes in a Western -led pressure campaign to get Russian President to be dedicated to peace talks.

Zelenskyy plans to travel to Ankara on Thursday where he will meet President Turkish Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and will wait for Putin’s arrival in Istanbul or anywhere else in Turkey.

“If you take the step to say you are ready for cessation of fire, opens the way to discuss all the items to end the war“Zelenskyy told journalists on Tuesday.

If Putin refuses to prove, “it only means one thing: that Russia is not ready for negotiations,” Zelenskyy said. In this case, North -American and European partners must continue with their threat to impose “strong sanctions” on Russia, he added.

The new chancellor of Germany, Friedrich Merz, said on Tuesday that European nations worked together in a “meaningful narrowing” of sanctions if they accepted that there was no “real progress” of Putin.

Merz said he admired Zelenskyy’s desire for commitment, but added: “I think more commitment and more concessions are no longer reasonable.”

Zelenskyy said he was not willing to meet any Russian official who was not Putin, as an “agreement” could only be made with the President of Russia.

If the leaders’ meeting does not take place, a team of Ukrainian negotiators could meet with Russian counterparts, according to Ukrainian President’s office.

Putin first made the idea of ​​a meeting in Istanbul between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators, but not leaders, in a brief Sunday speech, after the weeks of pressure from Kiev, Washington and European capitals to agree on a 30 -day unconditional fire.

Kremlin has refused to clarify if Russian President would attend. Asked about Putin’s plans on Tuesday, Kremlin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said “Russia continues to prepare for conversations” and would announce who will participate “as soon as the President considers it necessary.”

On Monday, Peskov criticized the western threat of more sanctions as “inappropriate”.

United States President Donald Trump has urged the two parties to have conversations as soon as possible.

Trump, who began his first foreign journey on his second term in Saudi Arabia Tuesday, said on Monday that he was open to Unite negotiations Among his Russian and Ukrainian counterparts in Turkey, “if I think things can happen, but we have to do it.”

The President of the United States said that the Secretary of State and the acting Minister of National Security Marco Rubio will travel to Turkey to participate.

Russia’s Vice Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov on Tuesday listed some of the topics Moscow hopes to be in the discussion in Istanbul, including “solving problems related to the default of the Kiev regime”, a term officials and propagandists who used to indicate a change in leadership in Ukraine, particularly Zelenskyy, who is Jewish.

Ryabkov said that “the recognition of realities” on the ground, including “the entry of new territories into the Russian Federation”, should also be on the agenda, referring to the southern parts of Ukraine under the Russian occupation.

The Ukrainian side seeks an immediate fire of 30 days as a prerequisite for broader formal negotiations, said Zelenskyy. If Putin agrees, the cessation of fire would be followed by low -level conversations focused on practical implementation, safety guarantees, and the wider framework for de -escalation, he said.

He said that since the United States proposed an unconditional fire more than two months ago, Kyiv has been ready to implement him. Russia, on the other hand, said, has continued its invasion, attacking Ukraine with hundreds of missiles and drones, and launching new offensive on the front line of 1,000 km.

Deep State, a Ukrainian analytical group near the Ministry of Defense, said that Russian forces this week had taken more ground in the Eastern Donetsk region, especially in the cities of Pokrovsk and Toretsk.

Ukrainian intelligence officials told Financial Times that Russia seems to be preparing for a larger offensive and transferred to the key toces of the battlefield, instead of their preparation for peace conversations.