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“Türkiye is favored by both sides,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Monday about Ankara’s role in mediating between Ukraine and Russia. Speaking to reporters, Peskov said they were grateful to Türkiye for creating conditions that allowed the negotiations between the two sides to continue. He emphasized that they were willing to advance talks with Ukraine and were awaiting Ukraine’s response to their proposal to establish three working groups in the third round of negotiations.
NATO member Türkiye is one of the most active countries working to ensure a permanent cease-fire between Ukraine and Russia. Its delicately balanced act of assuming a role as a mediator by keeping communication channels with both warring sides open provides a glimmer of hope in diplomatic efforts to find a solution and achieve peace in the Ukraine crisis. With its unique position of maintaining friendly relations with both Russia and Ukraine, Türkiye has garnered widespread praise for its efforts to end the war.
While Ankara has opposed international sanctions aimed at isolating Moscow, it has also closed its straits to prevent some Russian vessels from crossing through them.
On July 23, Istanbul hosted the third meeting of the Russian and Ukrainian delegations, who had also met in May and June in the city amid U.S. pressure to agree on a cease-fire to end their three-year conflict. Despite the urging of U.S. President Donald Trump, no major breakthrough was made.
“We aim to bring together the leaders of Ukraine, Russia and the U.S. to achieve peace in the ongoing war, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said last Friday.
“I might speak to Putin and Trump this week to see if we can hold a leaders’ meeting on the war in Istanbul,” the president told reporters after Friday prayers in Istanbul.
“The last meeting was at Çırağan. My foreign minister conducted the meeting on my behalf. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian delegation met with us in Ankara before moving on to Çırağan. I received them and had meetings with them. Of course, I also talked with Mr. Vladimir Putin during these meetings and we sought his support,” he elaborated.
Peskov said on Monday that Erdoğan had demonstrated political will for a Trump-Putin meeting in Türkiye, but there had been no tangible development so far on the matter.
Ukrainian and Russian negotiators have so far only agreed to hold prisoner exchanges. And Russia has since launched intense air attacks on Ukraine and seized more front-line territory.
Russia has demanded that Ukraine give up four regions, on top of Crimea, which it annexed in 2014. The Kremlin also insists that Ukraine should abandon any plans to join the NATO military alliance.
Ukraine has rejected the demands and expressed doubt that Russia wants a cease-fire.
On Saturday, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan underlined that one key agenda of the Russia-Ukraine talks in Istanbul is bringing the leaders together.
He recalled that Russia and Ukraine expressed their willingness to meet in Istanbul under Türkiye’s hosting, but noted that ongoing negotiations continue over the timing and conditions of the meeting. “As negotiators, we are making efforts to find a middle ground between Ukraine and Russia’s differing positions,” he said after a meeting with top diplomats of the Balkan countries in Istanbul on Saturday.
He pointed out increasing agreements on prisoner exchanges and humanitarian efforts, saying: “Both sides are showing goodwill and effort to implement this, which greatly pleases our president and us.”
Fidan highlighted Trump’s interest in the cease-fire between Russia and Ukraine, adding: “Our president wants to accelerate this process.
He is a firm believer in leaders’ diplomacy, believing that certain deadlocks between negotiating teams can be resolved through a leaders’ meeting. “We may take initiative to make this possible,” he added.
The foreign minister said that both the Russian and Ukrainian leaders are willing to meet, but there is a disagreement over the conditions for such a meeting.
He said the disagreement is not over whether the leaders should meet, but somewhat over the conditions, timing and agenda of the meeting, stressing that progress must first be made at the delegation level.
Fidan expressed hope that, once the groundwork is laid, a trilateral meeting hosted by Erdoğan in Istanbul could take place in the near future.
