Title : Former U.S. Officials Held Secret Talks With Russia About Ending The War In Ukraine
link : Former U.S. Officials Held Secret Talks With Russia About Ending The War In Ukraine
Former U.S. Officials Held Secret Talks With Russia About Ending The War In Ukraine
NBC: Former U.S. officials have held secret Ukraine talks with prominent Russians
The aim of the discussions is to lay the groundwork for potential negotiations to end the war, people briefed on the talks tell NBC News.
LONDON — A group of former senior U.S. national security officials have held secret talks with prominent Russians believed to be close to the Kremlin — and, in at least one case, with the country’s top diplomat — with the aim of laying the groundwork for potential negotiations to end the war in Ukraine, half a dozen people briefed on the discussions told NBC News.
In a high-level example of the back-channel diplomacy taking place behind the scenes, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov met with members of the group for several hours in April in New York, four former officials and two current officials told NBC News.
On the agenda of the April meeting were some of the thorniest issues in the war in Ukraine, like the fate of Russian-held territory that Ukraine may never be able to liberate, and the search for an elusive diplomatic off-ramp that could be tolerable to both sides.
Sitting down with Lavrov were Richard Haass, a former diplomat and the outgoing president of the Council on Foreign Relations, current and former officials said. The group was joined by Europe expert Charles Kupchan and Russia expert Thomas Graham, both former White House and State Department officials who are Council on Foreign Relations fellows.
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WNU Editor: I know about the Lavorov meeting. Russian media covered it at the time, and according to them it did not end well. And as to the unnamed Russians that these former U.S. officials had talks with. That is news to me.
So what are the prospects of "peace talks" advancing?
Sighhh .... IMHO there is none.
The Kremlin mindset is that the U.S. and its allies are trying to find a roadmap to freeze the conflict but maintain sanctions, war crimes charges against Putin at the Hague, continue to work hard to isolate Russia, and doing all of this while rebuilding the Ukraine military to restart the war sometime in the future.
What also does not help is that all the former signatories of the previous Minsk accord have now come out in public admitting that those peace talks were just a ruse to buy time for the West to help Ukraine buildup its military and be able to retake the rebel territories in the Donbas. Russia is not going to make that mistake again.
Russians see themselves fighting a war against an adversary that has publicly called for the killing of its leadership (i,e, US Senator Lindsay Graham), and the dismemberment of the Russian Federation. Add in the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines, a drone attack against the Kremlin that many now view was an attempt to assassinate Putin, massive military aid to Ukraine coupled with providing critical intelligence.
So yeah .... in this context .... U.S. talk about laying the groundwork for potential negotiations to end the war sound and look very hollow for many (if not most) Russians.
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