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Ex-Adviser to Yanukovych Shot Dead in Madrid Suburbs

Sputnik – 21.05.2025

Spanish police confirmed to RIA Novosti that Andriy Portnov, ex-adviser to former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, was shot dead on Wednesday morning outside a school in the city of Pozuelo de Alarcon near Madrid.

“We did receive a report about his death. We have no information about the perpetrators yet,” the police said.

Earlier in the day, the Cadena Ser radio station reported, citing police and emergency services, that Portnov was shot dead at the entrance to a school in Pozuelo de Alarcon.

Portnov was included in the Ukrainian database Myrotvorets (Peacemaker) as a “traitor to the motherland” in April 2015, according to the information on the Peacemaker website. He is accused of allegedly calling for murdering Ukrainian citizens and encroaching on the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian website Peacemaker is known for its scandalous posts, in which it reveals personal data of journalists and other citizens, labeling them “traitors to their homelands.”

Later in the day, Russian Foreign Ministry Ambassador-at-Large on the Kiev Regime’s War Crimes Rodion Miroshnik assumed that Portnov could have some information that was dangerous for Volodymyr Zelensky or someone from his entourage.

“Portnov was an influential official in the Yanukovych era. He could well have had information from the ‘forgotten past’ that could ruin the ‘impeccable reputation’ of certain individuals in the current government. Or he could have had other information that was dangerous for someone from Zelenskyy’s circle or for himself,” Miroshnik said on Telegram.

The assassination looks very much like an “extrajudicial execution,” he added.

“It is hard to believe in the random nature of a murder with a control shot to the head, as well as the lack of connection with the Zelensky regime,” Miroshnik added.

Meanwhile, Spanish newspaper 20minutos reported that Spanish investigators did not rule out a connection between Portnov’s murder and the conflict in Ukraine. There is, however, another line of enquiry, which links the murder to organized crime, the report said.

May 21, 2025 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance, War Crimes | , | Leave a comment

Trump should not threaten new sanctions when he talks to President Putin

By Ian Proud | Strategic Culture Foundation | May 19, 2025

The U.S. side has made various signals that it might impose massive new sanctions on Russia unless the war ends soon. This would be a huge mistake that would lock in the fighting for the rest of the year and leave Europe on the hook for a massive bill and political disruption that it cannot afford. Trump should not threaten Putin with sanctions when they talk on Monday 19 May.

In the run up to the Russia-Ukraine bilateral peace talks which finally took place in Istanbul last week, both the EU and the UK imposed new sanctions on Russia. On 9 May, as Russian commemorated victory Day, Britain imposed sanctions on Russia’s shadow fleet and the EU followed suit with its 17th package of Russia sanctions on 14 May, the day before the Istanbul talks were due to start. Both the UK and EU have threatened further sanctions should Russia not agree a full and unconditional ceasefire in Ukraine and, with Zelensky, have actively urged the U.S. to follow suit, which it has not done, so far. However, the Americans have spoken increasingly about the possibility of massive new sanctions against Russia: this would be a huge mistake.

Sanctioning a country before peace talks have already started, or while they are still going on, is already a bad look. Very clearly, the Ukrainians, Europeans and British hope that new sanctions will apply such pressure on Russia that it agrees to terms that are more favourable to the Ukrainian side. I.e. that Ukraine does not have to go back to the Istanbul 1 commitment to adopt permanently neutral status. The western mainstream press has been carpet bombing their intellectually degraded readers with the latest press line that Ukraine should not have to go back to the Istanbul 1 text as a starting point for talks.

But there’s a problem. For this strategy to be effective, the sanctions have to work.

As I’ve pointed out before, sanctions against Russian energy have had limited impact, not just since 2022, but since 2014. Nothing about the glidepath of sanctions since February 2014 suggests that new sanctions will work now.

This latest round of UK and EU sanctions aimed to apply more pressure on enforcement of the G7 oil price cap of $60 which was first imposed in December 2022. Since the war started, that policy has failed.

Between 2021 and 2024, total volumes of Russian oil exported fell by just 0.2 million barrels per day, or 2.6%. After a bumper year for tax receipts in 2022 caused by Russian tumbling rouble and skyrocketing energy prices, Russia pulled in current account surpluses of $49.4bn and $62.3bn in 2023 and 2024. This was on the back of still strong goods exports of $425bn and $433bn respectively.

There are several reasons why the oil price cap didn’t work, the biggest being that Russia diverted 3 million barrels per day, around 39.5% of total oil exports to India (1.9 mbd), Türkiye (0.6 mbd) and China (0.5 mbd). Türkiye and India boosted exports of refined fuels to Europe providing a backdoor route for Russian oil to Europe. The second reason the oil price cap didn’t work is the near ten month time lag between war starting and the limit being imposed, which gave Russia space to readjust before punitive measure had been imposed. During this period, oil prices also dropped sharply from the high of $120 in the summer of 2022, to around $80 when the measure was imposed: the G7 missed the boat to impose maximum damage; this reinforces the point I make all the time that coalitions cannot act with speed and decisiveness.

Today, the Russian Urals oil price is below the $60 G7 cap meaning that any registered shipping company can transport it without penalty, which renders the British and European sanctions as pointless in any case.

Let’s be clear, western nations imposing sanctions against Russia that don’t work is not a new phenomena. As I have pointed out many times before, the vast majority (92%) of people that the UK has imposed assets freezes and travel bans upon have never held assets in the UK nor travelled here. For companies, the figure is just 23. The same, I am sure, is true of EU and U.S. sanctions, which cover largely the same cast list of characters and companies, as we all share and compare the same lists of possible designations. Financial sector sanctions prompted a massive readjustment of Russia’s financial sector. Energy and dual use sanctions drove self-sufficiency in technology production, through Rosnet, Gazprom and RosTec: i.e. these companies invested more in R&D on component production while sourcing components from alternative markets, in particular China.

At well over 20,000 sanctions imposed so far, Russia’s economy has proved remarkably robust and its key export sectors still find ways to deliver similar volumes across the world. At some point, I hope policy makers in London, Brussels and Washington will start to ask whether this policy is working. We long ago passed the point of diminishing marginal returns. I fear, however, they have their heads in the sand or, possibly another, darker, place.

So, coming back to Trump’s phone call with Putin on Monday 19 May you might ask yourself, ‘so what if he imposes a few more sanctions if they won’t work anyway?’

Putin would see the imposition of new U.S. sanctions as a complete 180, destroying any emerging trust he had in Trump or any belief in America’s stated intentions to end the war in Ukraine.

It is clear to me that further U.S. sanctions on Russia would kill stone dead any chance of a ceasefire in Ukraine at a time when Russia still has the upper hand. Russia has increased the pace of its advance since the Victory Day ceasefire and seems to be adding new blocks of red to the battle map each day. At the current rate of advance, even without a catastrophic Ukrainian collapse, it seems realistic to expect that Russia would paint out the remaining territory in Donetsk and Luhansk during the remainder of this year. In the process they would need to overcome the heavily fortified towns of Pokrovsk, Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, in what would likely be brutal and attritional battles killing many thousands more on both sides.

Moreover, dragging out the war for longer would simply add to Europe’s liability to fund Ukraine’s war effort at a time when it is only ever going to lose. Ukraine is spending over 26% of GDP on defence in 2025 and 67.5% of its budget expenditure is on defence and security, leaving a budget black hole of $42bn that has to be filled. America under Trump isn’t going to fill this hole. And, as Ukraine is cut off from international lending markets, that black hole is being filled by Europe.

There is no money for this.

Europe has neither the political capital nor the funds to maintain a losing war in Ukraine at enormous expense without massive domestic political blowback in their own countries.

Notwithstanding the possibly understandable fear among European leaders of failing and being seen to fail in Ukraine, keeping the war going is at best, a gesture in cynical self-preservation, pushing their eventual political demise further down the track.

Unfortunately, we have been here so many times before. Right back to the Minsk II agreement, Ukraine has been pushing for ever more sanctions against Russia that only ever served to ramp up resentment and exacerbate the conflict. European leaders have invested too much in Zelensky and his self-serving demands aimed primarily at staying in power. He is quickly becoming the gun that shoots European elites in the head.

If Trump really wants to be seen as a peacemaker, he should avoid doing what every other western leader before him including Sleepy Joe did and resist the temptation to impose more sanctions. Instead, he should continue to press President Putin to continue to engage with bilateral peace talks that finally recommenced in Istanbul last week. He must also tell the Eurocrats and Zelensky that they must make compromises rather than plugging the same old failed prescriptions.

May 19, 2025 Posted by | Economics, Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

Diplomatic Chess, Ukraine the Pawn

By Patrick Lawrence | Consortium News | May 16, 2025

As was universally expected, little came out of Istanbul this week, where Ukrainian and Russian delegations met with the ostensible purpose of exploring a negotiated settlement of the proxy war the U.S. provoked three years ago. 

It is an odd state of affairs when even the people doing the talking did not anticipate anything useful to emerge from their talking.

After less than two hours of negotiation, the two sides agreed only to future talks on subsidiary questions: a prisoner exchange and a 30–day ceasefire — a ceasefire Kiev and its Western backers refused for years but are now desperate to implement.

There was no discussion of an accord to end the war and no final agreements other than one to continue negotiations. And the encounter was not without its acrimonious moments.

Talks to negotiate more talks are not much but not nothing. The two sides have met for the first time since March 2022, when, a month into the war, they previously convened in Istanbul and negotiated a draft document that would have ended the fighting — this until Boris Johnson, then the British prime minister, arrived to scuttle the accord so as to keep the war going. 

There is no feigning surprise or disappointment. It was evident during a week of incessant posturing that the Kiev regime and the European powers that have lately assumed the task of manipulating it, have no desire to begin substantive negotiations with the Russian Federation. 

No, for the British, the French, the Germans, and their client in Kiev, the imperative in the run-up to the Istanbul encounter on Friday was to appear earnestly dedicated to talks across a mahogany table while preventing even nascent progress toward a diplomatic settlement.

In this effort the Europeans have failed, at least for now. 

Trump Takes Over  

President Donald Trump effectively overruled them when, earlier this week, he responded, positively and vigorously, to President Vladimir Putin’s unexpected offer to open talks. Trump insisted, in all caps as is his wont, that Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, should forget the ceasefire and open negotiations “IMMEDIATELY!”

This appears to have pushed to the margins the British, French, and Germans, who have taken over as Zelensky’s hands-on minders since Trump assumed office in January.  But I see little chance Friday’s talks will mark the end of their effort to keep the war going and a settlement at bay — even as they pretend to stand for precisely the opposite. 

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Friedrich Merz set things in motion last weekend when they flew to Kiev for a hastily arranged summit with Zelensky. On their arrival, the British, French and German leaders grandly issued an ultimatum: Moscow must accept a 30–day ceasefire by Monday, May 12, or the Europeans would impose a punishing set of new sanctions on the Russians. 

So did the curtain rise on a lot of poor theater. As John Whitbeck, the international attorney resident in Paris, remarked on his privately circulated blog, this appeared to be an offer Moscow was bound to refuse in order to convey the impression the Europeans were doing their best for peace — but the Russians remained committed to war. 

The fun began then, too. Putin, in a late-night nearly immediate response  from the Kremlin, gave the Starmer–Macron–Merz ultimatum all the attention it merited — none — and wrong-footed the Europeans and Kiev by proposing Kiev and Moscow open negotiations in Istanbul on Thursday.

At this point — the chronology has been well-reported — Zelensky began several days of carrying on. The Russian proposal was mere theater: This was his opener. (See what I mean by fun?) O.K., I agree to talks in Istanbul, but I insist on a summit with Putin himself. Putin ignored this, too — as Zelensky and his sponsors knew he would. There must be a ceasefire first — another idea that Kiev and its sponsors dropped.

It was Trump’s intervention that brought the European follies to an end. After the U.S. president’s statements to the press and on social media, the Ukrainian TV–actor-turned-president finally agreed to send a team of Kiev officials, led by Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, to meet with a Russian delegation headed by Vladimir Medinsky, a prominent adviser to the Russian president. 

Late Friday afternoon the Russian and Ukrainian delegations both announced that they had agreed to resume talks, but for now only on the ceasefire question. “We are ready to continue contacts,” Medinsky said at a post-session news conference.

There was a little more to this encounter than that. In a report Friday evening The Telegraph quoted Medinsky telling the Ukrainians across the U–shaped negotiation table, “We don’t want war, but we’re ready to fight for a year, two, three, however long it takes. We fought Sweden for 21 years. How long are you ready to fight?”

Medinsky’s reference was to what Russians call the Great Northern War, which Russia waged against the Swedish Empire during the reign of Peter the Great, from 1700 to 1721.

And that is it, a door pried open after a soap opera’s worth of chicanery in London, Paris, Berlin, and Kiev.

Remember the Minsk Protocols  

Putin, French President Francois Hollande, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko at the Normandy format talks in Minsk, Belarus, Feb. 12, 2015. (Kremlin)

My take on the week’s events takes me back to the Minsk Protocols, which Moscow negotiated a decade ago with Kiev, Paris and Berlin. 

Signed in September 2014 and February 2015, these committed Ukraine to a new constitution whereby the Russian-speaking provinces in the nation’s east would be granted a considerable degree of autonomy. Kiev and Moscow signed, France and Germany serving as co-signatories backing the former.

Kiev ignored the Minsk accords from Day 1. And, as well-reported at the time, the French and Germans later acknowledged they co-signed only to allow Ukraine time enough to rearm so as to continue attacking the eastern provinces and prepare for the war that eventually broke out three years ago.

This pencil-sketched history is useful to understanding this week’s events and what preceded them. Putin got his fingers burned in Minsk, having personally negotiated the two protocols. I do not know when the Russian president decided the European powers could not be trusted, but he has certainly not trusted them since the Minsk debacle.

Last week’s events proved this a sound judgment. In an improvised game of diplomatic chess, Moscow got the Europeans in check this time, making dexterous use of Kiev as its pawn. 

Post–Istanbul, it appears now that the best chance of a settlement of the Ukraine conflict resides in the prospect of a Trump–Putin summit. This, if it comes to pass, would define the Ukraine crisis — altogether properly — as a subset of Trump’s project to restore relations with Moscow. 

And it would disarm, not to say humiliate the Europeans who have been leading the Continent to continue its support for the Kiev regime and the war. 

A couple of caveats are in order here. One, as earlier suggested, it is not at all clear we have heard the last of the European triumvirate who took center stage for a few days this week. Starmer, Macron and Merz, the last just appointed Germany’s new chancellor, are heavily invested in the Ukraine project and the Russophobia that propels it.

Two, as Putin and other Russian officials have made plain numerous times, and very pointedly this past week, substantive negotiations of a settlement of the Ukraine crisis must begin with mutual recognition of “root causes,” to take the phrase the Kremlin now favors. 

This is why Moscow nominated Istanbul as the venue for these new talks. In the draft Boris Johnson disrupted three years ago, these concerns were addressed.  

“We view these talks as a continuation of the peace process in Istanbul, which was unfortunately interrupted by the Ukrainian side three years ago,” Medinsky said at a press conference as he set out of Istanbul Thursday. “The aim of direct negotiations with the Ukrainian side is ultimately to secure lasting peace by addressing the fundamental root causes of the conflict.”

The phrase is too ubiquitous in the Russian discourse to ignore. The question now is whether Donald Trump, in any summit he may have with Vladimir Putin, will be at all equipped to address Russia’s concerns. 

If he does, he will fundamentally alter relations between the Western powers and Russia for the good — a diplomatic triumph. If he does not, he is unlikely to get anything more done than negotiators accomplished in Istanbul this week.

May 18, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , | Leave a comment

Putin outlines results Moscow seeks in Ukraine

RT | May 18, 2025

Russia is seeking to achieve “lasting and sustainable peace” by eliminating the root causes of the Ukraine conflict, President Vladimir Putin has said, in an extract of an interview released by Russia 1 TV on Sunday.

In a clip posted by journalist Pavel Zarubin on Telegram, Putin stated that Russia has “enough strength and resources to bring what was started in 2022 to its logical conclusion” while accomplishing Moscow’s key goals.

Russia wants to “eliminate the causes that caused this crisis, create conditions for long-term sustainable peace and ensure the security of the Russian state and the interests of our people in those territories that we always talk about,” he added.

The president was apparently referring to Crimea, the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, and the regions of Kherson and Zaporozhye, which overwhelmingly voted in favor of joining Russia in referendums in 2014 and 2022.

People in these former Ukrainian territories “consider Russian to be their native language” and see Russia as their homeland, he said.

Commenting on the ongoing diplomatic engagement with the US to settle the conflict, Putin acknowledged that “the American people, including their president [Donald Trump] have their own national interests.”

“We respect that, and expect to be treated the same way,” he added.

Putin’s remarks come on the heels of the first direct Russia-Ukraine talks since 2022. As a result of Turkish-mediated negotiations in Istanbul, both sides agreed to exchange lists of conditions for a potential ceasefire, conduct a major prisoner swap, and discuss a follow-up meeting. The Kremlin has not ruled out direct talks between Putin and Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky if the ongoing peace efforts result in progress and firm agreements.

Following the talks, US President Donald Trump announced he would hold a phone call with his Russian counterpart on Monday, which would focus on trade and resolving the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Meanwhile, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov discussed the Istanbul negotiations with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who welcomed the results of the talks.

May 18, 2025 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | 2 Comments

Russia outlines ceasefire conditions in Istanbul talks with Ukraine

Al Mayadeen | May 17, 2025

The Russian Ministry of Defense has revealed the conditions presented by Moscow during the Istanbul negotiations with Kiev, as shared by the Clash Report platform on social media.

The outlined terms reflect Russia’s position on a potential settlement in Ukraine, with an immediate ceasefire as the primary demand.

Russia’s ceasefire conditions

Neutrality modeled on Austria

The first condition proposed by Moscow is that Ukraine adopt a neutral status, similar to Austria’s model. This would prohibit the presence of foreign troops or non-Ukrainian military bases on Ukrainian territory, effectively excluding NATO or other military alliances from operating within the country.

No foreign troops or bases in Ukraine

Moscow emphasized that neutrality must be comprehensive, with Kiev legally committing to reject the stationing of foreign forces and equipment.

Territorial demands and border recognition

Among the key demands, Russia requires Ukraine to formally recognize its constitutional claims over five regions: Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, and the Crimean Peninsula.

The Russian Defense Ministry stressed that the immediate ceasefire is contingent upon the complete withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from all five regions claimed by Russia.

Renunciation of war compensation claims

Moscow is also seeking a mutual legal renunciation of any compensation claims related to war losses, including economic damage and human casualties.

Protection of Russian-speaking citizens

Russia demands that Ukraine commit to European standards on minority rights, specifically to safeguard the rights of Russian-speaking citizens. In addition, Moscow calls for an end to what it terms “nationalist propaganda” within Ukrainian society.

Russia, Ukraine agreed to exchange ceasefire conditions

Later on Saturday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia and Ukraine have agreed to exchange the lists of ceasefire conditions, noting that the Russian side is working on the matter.

The Russian side has prepared such a list and will hand it over, with exchange with the Ukrainian side,” he told reporters.

At the same time, the work on the resolution of the conflict in Ukraine has just started and it will be continued, he added.

Change in Russian delegation to negotiations not being discussed

Peskov pointed out that a change in the composition of the Russian delegation to the negotiations with Ukraine is not being discussed, emphasizing the importance of implementing the agreements reached during the recent Russia-Ukraine talks in Istanbul.

The Kremlin spokesperson also asserted that the ongoing negotiations “are and should be held in a closed format.”

Putin-Zelensky meeting possible if certain agreements reached

The Russian diplomat highlighted that a meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky is possible if delegations of both countries reach certain agreements.

“Such a meeting as a result of the work of the delegations of the two sides is possible when certain agreements of these delegations are reached,” he said.

Elsewhere, Peskov also said that Moscow considers the candidacy of Kiev’s signatory as the main and fundamental thing when signing documents between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations during the negotiations.

First direct talks since 2022

Russia and Ukraine held their first direct peace talks in over three years on Friday in Istanbul, reaching a key agreement on a large-scale prisoner exchange but making little headway on a ceasefire or broader political settlement.

The 90-minute meeting marked the first direct diplomatic engagement between Moscow and Kiev since 2022 and came amid continued hostilities and mounting international calls for a de-escalation of the conflict.

Both sides emerged from the session expressing cautious openness to further dialogue, though no immediate breakthrough was achieved on halting the war, now in its third year.

Ukraine entered the talks seeking an unconditional ceasefire, hoping to bring relief to areas devastated by the conflict and to ease the humanitarian crisis affecting millions.

Russia, however, dismissed the demand, and both sides instead agreed to present their respective “visions” for a potential ceasefire at a later stage, according to Russian lead negotiator Vladimir Medinsky.

Prisoner exchange agreement reached

The only concrete outcome of the talks was an agreement to exchange 1,000 prisoners from each side. Both delegations hailed the deal as a positive humanitarian step.

Ukrainian Defense Minister and chief negotiator Rustem Umerov described the agreement as a “great result”, noting that it set the stage for further negotiations.

Ukraine pushes for Putin-Zelensky summit

Kiev pushed for a direct meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Georgiy Tykhy stressed that progress would require “a meeting of leaders.”

Russia acknowledged Ukraine’s request for a summit but did not commit. Putin declined to attend the talks in Turkey, instead dispatching a lower-level delegation. Zelensky accused Putin of being “afraid” to engage directly and said Moscow was not approaching the talks “seriously”.

Rubio urges ‘peaceful end to the war’

Ahead of the negotiations, Ukrainian representatives met with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Trump’s special envoy Keith Kellogg, and national security advisors from Britain, France, and Germany.

State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said Rubio had urged “a peaceful end to the war” and emphasized that “the killing needs to stop.”

Speaking at a European summit in Albania, Zelensky called on the international community to impose further sanctions on Russia if the talks failed to yield results, warning of global consequences should diplomatic efforts collapse.

May 17, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , , | 1 Comment

Preliminary talks in Istanbul are a start… the real show to come is Trump and Putin

Strategic Culture Foundation | May 16, 2025

The talks in Istanbul this week provide a prospect for peace. It bears emphasizing that the three-year proxy war could have been avoided if diplomacy had been permitted by Washington in early 2022 instead of being sabotaged.

Three years on, we have a new president in the White House, and there appears to be a more enlightened policy. Or maybe it’s an implicit admission that the U.S. proxy war agenda is a failure and can’t go on.

In any case, Trump and his envoys are unequivocally saying that they want to stop the bloodshed in Ukraine. That’s a big change from his predecessor, Joe Biden, who vowed to back Ukraine for as long as it takes in a fantastical, reckless pursuit to strategically defeat Russia.

It was the Biden administration, along with the British government, that intervened to scupper nascent peace talks in March 2022 between Russia and Ukraine for a peace deal. Washington and London coaxed the Kiev regime to fight on with promises of more weapons.

The result: three more years of intense conflict, which have caused millions of casualties, mainly on the Ukrainian side. The proxy war has come perilously close to provoking an all-out world war between nuclear powers.

Trump appears to want peace. If he is genuine in that intention, then the American president will have to address the root causes of the conflict. Russia has consistently explained the deeper causes of NATO aggression and the militarization of Ukraine as a hostile bridgehead on its borders since the CIA-orchestrated coup in Kiev in 2014.

The American president has shown petulance at times, urging Ukraine and Russia to get down to a peace deal. He has even threatened Russia with more (futile) economic sanctions. What the Trump administration needs to understand is that resolving deep causes of conflict requires commensurate negotiations and a realistic commitment to lasting geopolitical security arrangements.

The talks in Istanbul this week to explore a peaceful resolution were initiated by Russian President Vladimir Putin in an announcement last week.

Russia’s delegation was led by Putin’s senior aide, Vladimir Medinsky. That speaks of consistency and commitment. Medinsky led the peace talks three years ago in Istanbul, which were then sabotaged in April 2022 by the American and British intervention.

This week, the Russian side held preliminary bilateral talks with the Americans led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Subsequently, the Russian and Ukrainian delegates engaged in a meeting convened by Turkish diplomats. It was the first direct encounter between Russian and Ukrainian officials since the March 2022 negotiations.

It is not clear if follow-up meetings will take place. But at least one might say that talks took place.

The key to any prospect of ending the conflict depends on Washington demonstrating the requisite commitment. Trump said this week again that he would like to hold a summit with Putin as “soon as possible.” The Kremlin has also said that a formal presidential meeting is desirable.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov cautioned that there must first be adequate preparation for meaningful discussions. That implies that any top-level meeting must be cognizant of Russia’s demands for a resolution, one that deals with the historic, systematic causes of the proxy war.

Western politicians and media denying Russia’s perspective are delusional or duplicitous. To claim that the conflict is all about “unprovoked Russian aggression” against “democratic Ukraine” and “Russian expansionism” towards Europe is a travesty. It’s a bogus narrative that precludes peaceful resolution. Trump seems to be aware of that. But he needs to go beyond a superficial “peace broker” charade.

If Trump wants a gimmicky big summit with Putin for PR ratings, as his tour of the Middle East this week illustrates his egotistical wont, he can forget it.

The meetings this week in Turkey can be seen as preliminary technical discussions.

However, President Trump needs to take the lead. Appropriately, a peaceful resolution will only happen at the senior level of the U.S. and Russian governments. That’s because the United States is the primary protagonist in the proxy war against Russia.

It is clear from the antics and theatrics of the Kiev regime this week that there is no prospect of a meaningful, lasting peace if negotiations are confined to that level. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky does not even have constitutional legitimacy after cancelling elections last year. His erratic behavior of grandstanding and mudslinging at the Russian diplomatic efforts proves that he is not capable of substantive negotiations.

The European leaders are also an impediment to achieving an authentic peace settlement. Even before delegations met this week in Istanbul, various non-entity European politicians were disparaging Russia’s diplomatic initiative. Macron, Starmer, Merz, Von der Leyen and Kallas were desperately trying to insult the Russian president, indulging Zelensky’s PR stunt demanding a face-to-face meeting with Putin in Istanbul.

The European Union also timed an announcement this week to double its supply of heavy-calibre munitions to Ukraine. Another provocation.

France’s Macron sought to impose a precondition for the talks by demanding a 30-day ceasefire. That was a flagrant attempt to sabotage the negotiations before they even started.

These people are not honest about ending the worst war in Europe since the end of World War Two. Disgracefully, they want the bloodshed to continue for their political survival and gratifying their obsessive Russophobic fantasies.

If Trump wants to end NATO’s proxy war against Russia, he will have to sideline the European naysayers and the Kiev puppet regime. Their involvement is counterproductive. One suspects that Trump already knows that.

An American and Russian agreement at the highest level is the only way to bring the war to an end. It is no use for the American side pretending that they are mere peace brokers. They are the main protagonist, not the European lapdogs nor the Kiev regime.

Preliminary talks are all very well. But they are just that. Preliminary. If the talks have any chance of succeeding, the American side must take responsibility for the war it started and fueled.

May 17, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Russia, Ukraine prepare for peace by getting ready for war

By M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | Indian Punchline | May 17, 2025 

May 16 will stand out as a turning point, for good or bad, in the Ukraine conflict. The main thing is, Russia-Ukraine ‘peace talks’ have resumed in Istanbul and will hopefully carry forward the threads of the draft agreement negotiated in March 2022. But caveats must be added. The fact that it took Turkish President Recep Erdogan three hours to persuade Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to green light the negotiations speaks for itself. 

On the other hand, Zelensky showed remarkable flexibility by violating his own presidential decree banning any such negotiations on the part of Ukrainian officials other than himself with Russian officials. Turkey showed again that it remains a significant influencer in the Ukraine conflict. 

The result was an extraordinary spectacle. Reports mention that the Russian delegation had not one but three meetings, in fact — with a Turkish-American team followed by a Turkish-American-Ukrainian team and culminating in an exclusive huddle with the Ukrainian team. 

The ‘bilateral’ Russian-Ukrainian negotiations reportedly touched on the topics of ceasefire options in the Ukraine conflict; a major prisoner exchange; a potential meeting between Zelensky and Russian president Vladimir Putin; an agreement in principle to hold a follow-up meeting and so on. 

The Ukrainian media reported that the Russian side repeated their demands for Kiev’s forces to vacate the remaining parts of the four eastern and southern regions that Moscow has annexed. Ukraine of course rejected the demand. Indeed, these talking points at the Istanbul meeting would have been a plateful for a meeting that lasted only for an hour and forty minutes. 

Turkiye has joined as a stakeholder, as the pacemaking in Ukraine provides an opportunity for it to work closely with the US, which could have positive fallouts for the two main discords that put strains on it in the recent years — Syria and the Kurdish problem. The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has taken a historic decision on May 12 to give up armed struggle and dissolve itself, which opens the possibility to end decades of political violence in Turkiye. The ‘peacemaker president’ in the White House can help Ankara to mediate a Kurdish settlement. 

Turkiye has promoted the US’ normalisation with the Islamist government in Damascus. Trump’s meeting with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh on Wednesday alongside the lifting of Washington’s sanctions against Syria, which shake up the geopolitics of the Middle East, will bring Turkiye and the US on the same page. 

Notably, all this is happening against the backdrop of a ‘westernist’ tilt in the Turkish foreign policies during the past year following Erdogan’s re-election as president. Traditionally, the equations between Trump and Erdogan remained cordial and friendly. Suffice to say, Trump can expect Erdogan’s cooperation in the peacemaking in Ukraine talks, where the Turkish leader’s excellent equations with Zelensky are an added factor, which was on display in Ankara yesterday. 

Erdogan held Zelensky’s hand through thick and thin. The high-tech Turkish drones supplied to Ukraine, which are to be manufactured locally,  will significantly boost Kiev’s military capability. Turkiye, as the inheritor of the Ottoman legacy, is home away from home for an influential Tatar community. Tatar language is an Oghuz language descended from Ottoman Turkish. In fact, Turkey has refused to recognise Crimea as part of Russia. Ukrainian Defence Minister, a close associate of Zelensky, is an ethnic Tatar.   

Moscow understands all this. Putin hastened to put behind the friction in Russo-Turkish relations in the downstream of the regime change in Syria last December to reach out to Erdogan on May 11 to discuss the direct talks between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul. The Kremlin readout said Erdogan “expressed his full support for Russia’s proposal and emphasised his willingness to provide a venue for the talks in Istanbul. The Turkish side will offer all possible assistance in organising and holding talks aimed at achieving sustainable peace… The leaders have also expressed mutual interest in further expanding the bilateral ties in trade and investment and, in particular, implementing joint strategic projects in energy.”

Erdogan is a difficult interlocutor to handle but Putin has been largely successful in keeping the relationship stable and (mostly) predictable. The Turkish factor can be a game changer if at some point Zelensky ceases to be the captive of the CoW4 (the four European musketeers of the so-called ‘coalition of the willing’ — Britain, France, Germany and Poland.) Trust Erdogan to shift gears to an activist role. 

On the whole, Russia has scored a diplomatic victory insofar as its initiative on ‘Ukraine direct talks without preconditions’ has found acceptability with Trump. The format of yesterday’s talks implied a resumption of the Russian-Ukrainian talks in Istanbul in 2022. Putin manoeuvred brilliantly to scatter the game plan of the CoW4 which strove to pull aside Trump incrementally and become party to continuing the war in Ukraine. 

The CoW4 felt encouraged lately by a certain perception that Trump  may impose draconian sanctions if Russia lacked sincerity of purpose. But so far, Trump has remained engaged with Putin. Last week, Trump stated that a breakthrough in the Ukraine conflict will be possible only out of a summit between him and Putin. Suffice to say, the dramatic happenings in Turkey yesterday signify a setback to the CoW4. 

The leader of the Russian delegation and presidential aide Vladimir Medinsky (who also headed the Russian team at the talks in Istanbul in 2022) has told the media that Moscow is “satisfied” with the results of the talks and is ready to “resume contacts” with Kiev. 

That said, Moscow will not let down its guard either. Putin held a briefing session on May 15 with the permanent members of the Security Council, Russia’s highest policymaking body, to deliberate on the upcoming Istanbul talks, which was attended by the members of the Russian negotiating group. The Kremlin readout stated that Putin “set tasks and charted the negotiating position” of the Russian delegation in Istanbul.

On the other hand, the Kremlin also asserted simultaneously that no matter the talks in Istanbul, Russia’s military operations in Ukraine shall continue. With immaculate timing, Putin chose May 15 to also make the stunning announcement of the appointment of Colonel-General Andrey Mordvichev (nicknamed “General Breakthrough”) as the Commander of the Russian Ground Forces. 

Gen. Mordvichev has a tough reputation as the commander of the 8th Guards Combined Arms Army of Russia’s Southern Military District, which was heavily involved in the devastating 2022 siege of Mariupol, and in the Battle of Avdiivka in 2023-2024, a turning point in the conflict in Ukraine. Gen. Mordvichev’s appointment comes amidst reports claiming that Russia is preparing to launch a major new offensive in Ukraine. Ukraine claims that over 600,000 Russian troops are presently deployed in Ukraine.

But then, Zelensky is also moving on a dual track. Ukraine’s Finance Minister Sergeii Marchenko, 43, told a high-level panel at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development annual meeting on March 14 in London, “To prepare for peace, you have to get ready for war. We have to plan. You may call me a cynic, but actually I’m just a Finance Minister.”  

May 17, 2025 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , | 1 Comment

France leading West’s ‘party of war’ – Russia

RT | May 16, 2025

France has emerged as one of the leaders of the “hybrid war” against Moscow, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has said. She made her remarks after the EU agreed to its 17th package of sanctions.

France, together with the United Kingdom, proposed the ‘Coalition of the Willing’ to take a more proactive role supporting Ukraine in its fight with Russia in February 2025 after the new administration of US President Donald Trump moved to adopt a more conciliatory stance towards resolving the conflict.

“It is common knowledge that since 2022, Paris has been one of the most uncompromising participants in the West’s hybrid war against our country,” Zakharova said during a press call on Thursday.

“Over the past few months, the French have effectively become the leaders of the West’s ‘party of war,’” she added, citing France’s military aid to Ukraine and its push for additional sanctions on Russia.

“France has played a major role in devising illegitimate sanctions packages in the past. Now, it is attempting to blackmail us with new, supposedly broader sanctions,” Zakharova said.

She argued that the restrictions are part of a “trade war” aimed at “hindering Russia’s economic, technological, and humanitarian development, and at undermining its industrial potential.” Russia, she added, will have a “measured response” to any new restrictions.

French President Emmanuel Macron has said the EU would impose new sanctions “in the coming days” if Moscow does not accept Ukraine’s demand for an unconditional 30-day ceasefire. Earlier this year, Paris delivered a first batch of Mirage 2000 fighter jets to Kiev.

Russia has warned that military aid to Ukraine would only lead to further escalation. President Vladimir Putin has insisted that, for a lasting ceasefire, Ukraine must halt its mobilization campaign, stop receiving weapons from abroad, and withdraw its troops from all territory claimed by Russia.

May 16, 2025 Posted by | Militarism, Russophobia | , , , | Leave a comment

Russia-Ukraine talks conclude – media

RT | May 16, 2025

Direct talks between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul have ended, with the two delegations departing from the venue and press statements being prepared, a TASS source has said.

The head of the Ukrainian delegation, Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, stated that Friday’s talks at Dolmabahce Palace had focused on a prisoner exchange and versions of a potential ceasefire, according to RBK-Ukraine.

A potential meeting between Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin was also reportedly raised, and Umerov added that an update on possible new negotiations would be shared soon.

He also stated that both delegations had agreed to an exchange involving 1,000 prisoners from each side. Russia’s chief negotiator, Vladimir Medinsky, also confirmed that an exchange is being prepared.

Medinsky added that Kiev had requested a meeting between Putin and Zelensky, and that Moscow has taken note of the proposal. He stated that overall, the Russian delegation was satisfied with the outcome of the talks and is ready to continue contacts.

According to Medinsky, Russia and Ukraine will each present their detailed vision of a possible ceasefire, after which the negotiations will continue.

The talks had been expected to begin on Thursday, after Putin suggested resuming the negotiations which had been broken off in Istanbul three years ago.

The Russian team waited for the Ukrainian delegation to arrive for an entire day, although Zelensky only named his delegation on Thursday evening.

Moscow and Ukraine last held direct talks in April 2022. Following initial reports that an agreement had been reached, Kiev unilaterally withdrew from the talks. Putin later blamed Western interference and, in particular, then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who had reportedly urged Kiev to “just continue fighting,” for derailing the peace process.

Russia, which had withdrawn its forces from the outskirts of Kiev as a goodwill gesture, later accused Ukraine of backtracking, saying it had lost trust in kiev’s negotiators.

May 16, 2025 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

Negotiations or Political Theatre in Istanbul?

Prof. Glenn Diesen on MOATS with George Galloway
Glenn Diesen | May 15, 2025

How will the war end? The position of Ukraine and NATO continues to go from bad to worse, yet there is still a reluctance to engage in genuine discussions. There is subsequently a growing possibility that there will eventually be a collapse of the government in Ukraine, which would allow Moscow to dictate the political settlement. Yet, even as the situation goes from bad to worse, the Europeans and Ukraine are reluctant to engage with Russia in genuine negotiations. Part of the problem is evidently the extent of demands from the Russian side, although the Russian demands will only grow as the war drags on.

May 15, 2025 Posted by | Militarism, Video | , , , , | Leave a comment

Russia Calls Out US Over Ukraine Biolabs and Demands More Than Empty Words

Sputnik – 15.05.2025

MOSCOW – Russia remains open to contacts with the United States on the military biological program in Ukraine and hopes to remove concerns on this account, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Thursday.

“We have repeatedly noted and repeat again that we remain open to bilateral contacts with the American side on this topic [military biological program in Ukraine] in order to eliminate relevant irritants. We expect Washington to take the necessary steps to address Russia’s concerns about US military biological activity,” Zakharova told a briefing.

Moscow considers US efforts to strengthen control over biological activities as a step in the right direction, Zakharova said, adding that the measures announced by Washington are not enough to address Russia’s concerns about the US military biological activities abroad.

May 15, 2025 Posted by | Deception, Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

Let’s just get on with the planned Istanbul peace talks on Thursday, whether or not Putin and Zelensky meet

By Ian Proud | Strategic Culture Foundation | May 14, 2025

As we gear up for the first direct talks between Russia and Ukraine since the failed Istanbul talks of March 2022, a complex game of brinkmanship is underway.

Not surprisingly, in my view, President Putin ignored the coalition of the willing’s ultimatum to Russia to embark on an unconditional ceasefire for thirty days or face massive new sanctions. Instead he proposed what the Americans have been pushing for since Trump assumed office, direct bilateral talks with Ukraine in Istanbul on Thursday 15 May.

I have long argued that the only route out of the war in Ukraine is through talks. Compromise was offered by both sides in the first round of Istanbul talks in March 2022. Any new negotiations will require compromise from both sides, but the difference today is that the cards are more heavily stacked in Russia’s favour than they were in 2022.

Against this backdrop, President Zelensky has called on President Putin to meet him personally in Istanbul on Thursday. From my perspective, this appears an attempt to call off talks if Putin doesn’t show up.

Usually, when Heads of State meet, officials will have hammered out the negotiation for some time before hand. The leaders can then arrive and either sign on the dotted line or tackle the most difficult issues one on one. It’s now Tuesday 13 May. There is simply no way that Russian and Ukrainian officials will have lined up the framework for a deal for both leaders to sign in Istanbul on Thursday.

Even if Putin showed up on Thursday, Zelensky isn’t going to announce unilaterally that Ukraine is giving up its NATO ambition before the full negotiations have even started. Whether you agree or not, this is self-evidently Russia’s core ‘root cause’ of the war. The new German Foreign Minister, Johann Wadephul recently repeated the line that Ukraine’s path to NATO is irreversible, even though the Trump administration disagrees.

A form of words on Ukraine’s NATO aspiration that is agreeable to both sides in the war will take time to draft. And there’s a huge list of other detailed points that have to be addressed, including the line of control, the role of military forces from other states, the return of Ukrainian children, the protection of minority languages and so on.

Every statement that Zelensky has made since the war started has emphasised the need for the west to pile more pressure on Russia to ensure ultimate victory. He would meet Putin in Istanbul without the back slapping adulation that he receives in western capitals and with no pressure cards in his back pocket.

That doesn’t mean I think a meeting shouldn’t happen, because I do. The image of both war times leaders meeting in Istanbul, however awkward and uncomfortable, could be deeply symbolic in announcing the commencement of long overdue peace talks between officials. They could agree, face to face, to maintain a ceasefire for as long as those peace talks continued.

But no leader likes to turn up to any international meeting without the preparatory ground work in place. There is deep enmity between Putin and Zelensky for obvious reasons. Given Zelensky’s penchant for publicity stunts, the Russian side would want to be absolutely sure that the choreography of any meeting and the deliverables – what they would announce, however limited – had been agreed.

Putin will know that if he does not now turn up to Istanbul that Zelensky will hit the international airwaves calling for massive sanctions. But that if he meets Zelensky and a comprehensive deal isn’t agreed there and then – a frankly impossible feat it seems to me – then the same calls for massive sanctions against Russia will be made.

Of course, Putin will also know that Europe can’t muster new sanctions massive enough to make a difference at this late stage in the process, having exhausted most avenues since 2014. On Victory Day, Britain unilaterally announced the ‘biggest ever sanctions package’ against Russia’s so-called shadow fleet of oil tankers. The idea that unseaworthy hulks are carrying illicit Russian oil into Britain is obviously fanciful. But in any case, with the global oil price now close to the G7 oil price cap on Russian oil, the idea of a shadow fleet, delivering oil at its market rate, has fallen away. Britain’s February sanctions package against 107 persons and entities was labelled the largest sanctions package since 2022. Let’s be clear, the biggest sanctions package against Russia was imposed in February 2022, and everything since that time has offered diminishing marginal returns.

But that’s not really the point. By trying to force a showdown in Istanbul, Zelensky may want to continue to paint Russia as the aggressor and to press the case for more military aid, having asked for three million new artillery shells during his recent trip to Prague. However, this war really must now end, having blighted over one million lives already.

Boris Johnson was wrong in March 2022 to discourage Zelensky from accepting the first Istanbul peace deal precisely because he could not back up the promise that he made; to support Ukraine for as long as it takes. Even though Britain continues to pump £4.5bn in yearly military aid into Ukraine, that sum pales against the free aid that the U.S. offered under Joe Biden.

Trump is offering nothing more now than to plunder Ukraine’s resources so that it can buy American weapons, and Europe cannot afford to make up the difference, for as long as it takes. Ukraine is still losing on the battlefield and now, apparently, treating its traumatised troops with ketamine to help them deal with the PTSD.

Despite significant risks around inflation and high interest rates caused by the enormous fiscal splurge on its war economy, Russia is still growing at a respectable rate. Europe is not.

For now, President Putin is keeping his powder dry by not responding to Zelensky’s relentless press stunts. It’s clear to me that Russia’s initiative of a second round of Istanbul peace talks from Thursday is essential in edging both sides closer to a cessation of the killing that should have ended over three years ago. Whether or not both leaders meet at the start or at the end of those negotiations, let’s just please get down to the business of talking.

May 14, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | 1 Comment

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