President Volodymyr Zelensky has said that he is ready for a 3-way meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Recall that Putin recently said that he was prepared to meet Zelensky; however, when the latter invited the Russian to a meeting in Istanbul, Putin didn’t show up. Instead, Russian and Ukrainian delegations held lower-level peace talks on the 16th of May.
Zelensky has now revealed that he has no issues with a trilateral meeting involving all 3 leaders if Putin is not comfortable with a one-on-one meeting with him.
According to him, if the Russian president is open to both of them holding individual meetings with Donald Trump, he is not against that as well.
“We are ready to meet at the level of leaders. The American side knows this, and the Russian side knows this. We are ready for the ‘Trump, Putin, and me’ format, and we are ready for the Trump-Putin, Trump-Zelensky format, and then the three of us.
If Putin is not comfortable with a bilateral meeting, or if everyone wants it to be a trilateral meeting, I don’t care. I am ready for any format,” he said.
According to him, various venues are being considered for future peace talks between Ukraine, Russia, and the U.S., with Istanbul, Switzerland, and the Vatican being tipped as potential destinations for the discussion.
He, however, noted that Russia has kept opposing the Vatican, suggesting the unacceptable Belarus instead, so Turkey might be the likeliest location for the next round of negotiation.
“The Turkish side knows that we are discussing several sites. And that we have done preparatory work on the Vatican and Switzerland.
Vatican was supported by everyone except Russia, as can be seen in the media,” he added.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov recently said that Moscow will keep opposing a 2nd round of peace talks with Ukraine in Istanbul.
He frowned at the Vatican as a potential venue, stating that the Catholic seat is not an ideal platform for negotiations between two Orthodox Christian nations.
He further confirmed that the next round of talks will be announced as soon as possible.
3 years ago, Turkey hosted peace negotiations. Since then, Ankara has maintained regular contact with both Kyiv and Moscow, while facilitating multiple prisoner exchanges, as well as the now-defunct Black Sea Grain Initiative.
