Talks in Istanbul in between Turkeys top diplomat and a Russian delegation have actually ended with the two sides set to reunite Friday with the Ukrainians, a foreign ministry source said.The conference between Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and the delegation headed by Vladimir Medinsky at Istanbuls Dolmabahe Palace ended up late on Thursday, the source added.
The conference has actually ended.
Tomorrow there will be more talks in different formats, he stated, suggesting that trilateral talks between Russia, Ukraine and Turkey are on the program.
There would likewise be a round of U.S., Ukrainian and Turkish talks.
It has actually not been settled whether there will be a quadrilateral format, organizing officials from all four countries, he added.Russia and Ukraine had been expected to fulfill Thursday in Istanbul for their first direct peace talks in more than 3 years.But as the day wore on with no concrete signs of timings, it remained uncertain when the sides would meet, with U.S.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio recommending the meetings would occur on Friday.Speaking to press reporters on the sidelines of a NATO top in the southern seaside city of Antalya, Rubio said he would satisfy Ukraines top diplomat, Andrii Sybiha, in Istanbul on Friday.And he stated a lower-level U.S.
official would meet the Russian delegation.
I want to be frank ...
we do not have high expectations of what will occur tomorrow, Rubio told press reporters, saying he hoped Turkey would work to bring the 2 delegations together.Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who had actually flown to Turkey in the hope of fulfilling a high-level Russian delegation in Istanbul, instead remained in Ankara, where he held talks with Turkeys Recep Tayyip Erdoan.With Russia appearing with a fairly low-level group, Zelensky then chose to send his defense minister, Rustem Umerov, to lead the Ukrainian delegation.Medinsky, who heads the Russian group, is a hawkish adviser to Russian President Vladimir Putin who has questioned Ukraines right to exist and led stopped working talks in 2022 at the start of the war.