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‘We’ve Got a F–king Spy in This Place’: Inside America’s Greatest Espionage Mystery

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Post date May 24, 2025

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Illustrations by Hokyoung Kim for POLITICO

R.M. Schneiderman is a writer and editor based in Nashville. He’s the former deputy editor of Newsweek and has been on staff at The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, among other publications.

On the night of March 10, 1986, Michael Sellers parked his car on a dark Moscow street and peeled off his disguise: a Mission Impossible-style prosthetic mask that made him look like a Black colleague who worked at the embassy. He’d used it to slip past the guards watching the diplomatic compound where he lived. But he’d still have to be careful. On paper, Sellers was an ordinary American diplomat, but the KGB had identified him as a CIA officer and kept him under heavy surveillance.

Sellers quickly changed into another disguise — a typical Soviet overcoat, glasses and a fur-lined Russian chapka hat with built-in hair extensions — before ditching the car to blend into the crowd. He took a circuitous route to shake anyone who might be following him. His mission was to meet a valuable asset the agency had cultivated inside the KGB.

About a year earlier, in June of 1985, the Soviets had begun foiling dozens of sensitive American operations and rounding up agents working for the CIA and FBI. A few were lucky enough to escape. Some were sent to the gulag. Most got a 9mm bullet to the back of the head. The bloodbath was part of what the press dubbed the “Year of the Spy,” but the losses continued long after 1985. “There was a gut-wrenching sense of free fall,” Sellers writes in his forthcoming book, Year of the Spy, which chronicles the agency’s turbulent Cold War battle with the KGB in Moscow. “We didn’t know what had caused this disaster.”

Sellers hoped his agent, whom the agency codenamed “COWL,” might have information about how the Soviets were catching so many of their assets. But if the KGB unmasked COWL, he would be the next to die. COWL had been acting erratically and missed a scheduled meeting four months prior. His behavior led many in the CIA to worry he’d already been exposed, but the agency was desperate for information; it felt like the risk was worth it.

Two hours after he’d left the embassy, Sellers changed into a third disguise — a wig and mustache — then arrived at the pre-arranged meeting site: the parking entrance to an apartment building in Moscow’s tree-lined Lenin Hills district. But when he spotted COWL, Sellers sensed something was wrong. The once strong and confident man had lost weight and was cowering like a beaten dog. COWL had clearly been arrested and tortured. Sellers knew exactly what was coming next: a half-dozen vehicles descended. A group of KGB officers burst out of them, grabbed Sellers, threw him into a van and sped off towards Lubyanka, the KGB’s neo-baroque headquarters.

After hours of interrogation, the Russians released Sellers and expelled him from the Soviet Union. COWL fared far worse — he was tried and executed. To this day, his fate makes Sellers wonder: How did the KGB unravel the agency’s network of spies in Moscow?

The intense, decades-long investigation to answer that question would ultimately involve counterintelligence experts at both the FBI and the CIA. Among them: Paul Redmond, an abrasive, literary savant with a penchant for bowties and F-bombs, who became the head of CIA counterintelligence in the mid-1990s. His FBI counterpart was David Szady — the “Z-man,” as his peers called him — a charismatic, driven former chemistry teacher who, like Walter White in reverse, traded in his beakers and Bunsen burners for the rush of chasing spies at the bureau. He eventually became the FBI’s head of counterintelligence after 9/11.

Between 1985 and 2006, both Redmond and Szady played key roles in mole hunts that uncovered three high-profile Soviet spies responsible for the deaths of more than a dozen American assets. These investigations were among the most extensive and grueling in U.S. history. Hundreds of U.S. intelligence officials came under suspicion — a top spy hunter would become one of the prime suspects — disrupting or destroying some of their careers. “These are painful investigations,” Szady said. “They take a long time. But you have to run them to the end.”

In a series of exclusive interviews with POLITICO Magazine, Szady and Redmond — along with dozens of other former intelligence officials — revealed new details about their work together and the controversies that developed between their agencies as the FBI tried to solve what is arguably America’s greatest espionage mystery. Was there yet another Soviet mole — a so-called “Fourth Man” — at the highest levels of American intelligence?

That crucial search may now be imperiled by Kash Patel, the MAGA diehard and director of the FBI, who has expressed his desire to reorient his bureau away from intelligence work. In September 2024, Patel appeared on The Shawn Ryan Show and lambasted the FBI and its leaders, claiming they’re part of a Deep State conspiracy against Trump, going back to the Russia investigation that dogged his 2016 campaign and his first years in office. “The biggest problem the FBI has had has come out of its intel shops,” he said. “I’d break that component out of it. I’d take the … employees … and send them across America to chase down criminals.”

The FBI says it’s committed to catching spies. But if Patel follows through on this idea, he might weaken or even eviscerate the Bureau’s counterintelligence capabilities, making it easier for America’s enemies — China, Russia, Iran and others — to infiltrate the U.S. government and private companies. “We’re going to catch fewer spies and only know about the spies when it’s too late,” Frank Figliuzzi, a former assistant director for counterintelligence at the FBI, said. “That’s really dangerous.”

The prospect that the hunt for the “Fourth Man” — and other longstanding, deadly, spy vs. spy cases — might be ignored, is an affront to those who suffered and died from the betrayal, according to former counterintelligence officials. “If there’s someone out there who was the ‘Fourth Man,’” Sellers said, “there’s blood on their hands.”

‘We’ve got a fucking spy in this place’

For the Americans, the devastating compromises didn’t end with COWL. As 1986 dragged on, the KGB nabbed four more CIA assets. In October, the FBI learned that two agents they’d cultivated inside the Soviet embassy in Washington were dead. Months earlier, the KGB had lured both men back to Moscow to face trial and execution.

At CIA headquarters in Langley, Redmond, then the head of counterintelligence for Soviet and Eastern European operations, was deeply involved in the agency’s effort to find out what had happened. At first, they blamed Edward Lee Howard, a disgruntled former CIA officer who had been fired in 1983 for drug use, deception and theft. A KGB defector fingered Howard as a mole in August of 1985, but he fled to Moscow before the FBI could arrest him. The CIA quickly realized, however, that Howard couldn’t explain all their burned ops and dead assets. The agency was still losing people in Moscow, most of whom Howard had no knowledge of. To complicate matters, the KGB had been sending a stream of disinformation and double agents — fake defectors, fake scientists, even a fake priest — to try to dupe the CIA. “Nothing in this business,” Redmond recalled, “is what it fucking seems.”

As the Soviets were rounding up and killing U.S. assets in 1985, some of Redmond’s colleagues had a thought: What if a mole wasn’t the culprit? What if, for instance, their communications were compromised and that’s how the KGB had done so much damage so quickly? To test the theory, Milt Bearden, the CIA deputy division chief, along with Redmond and a small group of other high-level CIA officials, launched a clever cloak-and-dagger operation to find out. Bearden flew to Kenya, Redmond said, while another officer went to the CIA’s Moscow Station. Both sent cables falsely claiming the agency had recruited loyal KGB officers in Nairobi and Bangkok. If Moscow recalled their officers in either city, the CIA would know the Russians were listening. The KGB took no action against the officers mentioned in the cables, leading Redmond and his colleagues to conclude the Russians hadn’t tapped into their communications.

A few months later, however, as the KGB continued to foil CIA operations, the Soviets launched another, more elaborate, deception of their own. Beginning in March of 1986, around the time of Sellers’ arrest, they sent the agency a series of letters from a fake volunteer calling himself “Mister X.” These letters cast aspersions on a CIA officer, but perhaps most tellingly, they also warned that the KGB had penetrated the agency’s encrypted communications. This was a cunning lie, as the CIA already knew from their false cable operation. And for Redmond, the elaborate nature of the Mr. X deception was a clue. “They were trying to protect something really big in the CIA,” he told POLITICO Magazine. “That helped me get attention from upstairs that we’ve got a fucking spy in this place.”

Soon, Congress started paying attention as well. Paul Joyal, director of security for the United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence at the time, recalls that the committee was “horrified by the [CIA’s] stable of Soviet assets wiped out in such a short period of time.” But initially, CIA leadership was reluctant to admit they might have more traitors in their ranks. Endless Soviet mole hunts had paralyzed the agency during the 1960s and 1970s. Senior CIA officials had seen the damage those investigations had done to operations as well as the lives and reputations of those who’d fallen under suspicion.

Despite the lack of enthusiasm, Redmond and a small team of trusted CIA colleagues launched a series of investigations, some in conjunction with the FBI. These mole hunts continued for more than three years as Redmond moved into a management position in the CIA’s Soviet and Eastern European division. But when he returned to spy hunting as the deputy chief of the agency’s newly created counterintelligence center in 1991, he realized they had made little to no progress. Redmond quickly pushed for a new mole hunt and added two FBI investigators to the team. Together, they built momentum and finally homed in on a second spy, CIA officer Aldrich Ames, who was flaunting his wealth. He drove a Jaguar and paid cash for an upscale house in Arlington, none of which he was seemingly able to afford. They turned the case over to an FBI squad led by Special Agent Les Wiser, who found the evidence they needed to prosecute Ames. Investigators pinned at least 10 dead assets on Ames’ treachery. Rudy Guerin, one of the FBI agents who debriefed the spy, described him as a “suit and tie serial killer.” In 1994, a judge sentenced Ames to life in prison.

The fact that it took the agency nearly a decade to nail Ames ignited outrage on the Hill. In response, CIA director James Woolsey reprimanded 11 top CIA officials. Yet he praised Redmond for keeping the investigation going, calling him the “[lone] voice crying out in the wilderness,” The New York Times reported. Woolsey soon promoted Redmond to be the associate director of operations for counterintelligence.

But it didn’t take long for the FBI and the CIA to realize Ames didn’t account for all the blown agents and operations. Another spy was still out there, still passing secrets to the Russians and still putting lives at risk.

Daring Escapes and Caviar Debts

Among the dozens of compromises the FBI felt Ames couldn’t explain was the case of Oleg Gordievsky. He was the KGB’s head of London spy operations, while living a double life as a British agent in 1985. Shortly after the CIA learned that Gordievsky was secretly working for the U.K., the KGB recalled him to Moscow, a clear sign they suspected him of being a traitor. Realizing that someone uncovered his espionage, Gordievsky alerted his British handlers at the MI6 spy agency, and they smuggled him out of the U.S.S.R. in the trunk of a car.

During Ames’ debrief, FBI interviewers determined he couldn’t have compromised Gordievsky. “We pulled all the dates for the timing and they just didn’t seem to work,” said Wiser, the FBI squad leader. It couldn’t have been Howard either — he was long gone by the time the CIA learned Gordievsky’s identity. Wiser hopped on a flight to London to interview the KGB turncoat in person. The FBI’s takeaway: another spy was out there, maybe even more than one.

And so, starting in 1994, the FBI expanded its mole hunt. Dozens of FBI agents and analysts, led by supervisor Mike Rochford, worked with their counterparts in the CIA to catch the spy or spies who were still passing secrets to the Russians and getting American assets killed. Their target’s codename: GRAYSUIT.

The investigation started with a pool of over 200 potential suspects. By 1996, Rochford’s team had whittled it to just over 10. Both FBI and CIA investigators felt rising pressure from their leadership to wrap up the investigation. Agents and analysts at the Bureau conferred with the top analysts in the CIA and they all agreed that the most likely suspect was an officer working in counterintelligence for the agency named Brian Kelley. “They had me convinced,” remembered Szady, who became the FBI executive in charge of the CIA’s analysts in its counterespionage group at Langley shortly thereafter.

As the hunt dragged on, FBI investigators surveilled and interrogated Kelley and even members of his family. Kelley was suspended from the agency, as was his daughter, Erin, also a CIA officer. His oldest son Barry recalls FBI investigators telling him his father’s arrest was “imminent.” For months Kelley’s children lived in dread of the day they would pick up a newspaper to read their father was “the worst spy since Benedict Arnold,” recalls Barry. The arrest never happened. The FBI never found any hard proof Brian Kelley had betrayed his country. But it feared more people would die unless they quickly wrapped up the case. As the decade came to a close, more than 19 agents working for U.S. intelligence had been killed, captured or disappeared.

Then, in 2000, Rochford and the FBI recruited an ex-KGB source who had exactly what they were looking for. He’d hand-copied GRAYSUIT’s entire KGB file and even pilfered a tape-recording of the spy speaking to his Soviet handlers from a phone booth in Fairfax County decades earlier. The catch? The source was in deep debt to the Irkutsk Mafia over a caviar deal gone bad and wanted a lot of money to give up the material. The FBI compensated the source with cash and benefits valued at $7 million and orchestrated a brazen operation to smuggle the mole’s top-secret KGB files out of Moscow.

Those files arrived at FBI headquarters in November 2000. Most of the investigators expected they would contain proof of Kelley’s treachery. The moment they heard the voice on the tape, however, they knew it was someone else. (Kelley was reinstated at the CIA in 2001, but neither the bureau nor the agency could undo the damage they had done to his life and career. He died in 2011.)

At first, the actual spy’s hushed speech, along with the poor recording quality, made it difficult for the bureau to identify him definitively. But FBI investigators pulled together key clues from the files that pointed unequivocally not toward Langley but someone inside their own building: Robert Hanssen, who’d run the FBI’s Soviet analytical unit in the 1980s and was now a liaison to the State Department.

It was a shocking, demoralizing moment for the bureau, especially after they’d been wrong about Kelley. Even worse, as the FBI prepared to gather evidence to arrest Hanssen, it realized that even he didn’t account for all of the dead agents and ops gone bad going back to 1985 — including the case of Gordievsky. That and dozens of other clues pointed to someone beyond Howard, Ames and Hanssen — a “fourth man.” The FBI realized it would have to start all over, looking for yet another spy.

‘I’m absolutely certain it was a CIA guy’

There was always a chance the FBI investigators were wrong — that no such mystery mole still lurked inside the highest echelons of the American government. But the mere possibility of it was a national security nightmare. In addition to threatening the lives of agents working for U.S. intelligence, such a high-level spy might also have access to military secrets, making it easier for America’s adversaries to kill U.S. or allied soldiers. Perhaps the most chilling possibility, though, was that this Russian asset had recruited a network of spies capable of undermining America for generations.

Outside of the FBI, and across other intelligence agencies, rumors spread about another Russian mole. Was it a man? A woman? Multiple people? Or was it all a mirage in the murky world of counterintelligence? Sporadic mentions of a mole leaked to the public. In their 2003 book, The Main Enemy, Bearden and James Risen first dubbed the alleged spy “the Fourth Man.” “I’m absolutely certain it was a CIA guy,” said Bearden, who was the deputy in charge of Soviet Bloc operations in 1985. “I didn’t come to that conclusion easily.”

Decades later, Robert Baer, a CIA officer turned best-selling author, dove into the mystery with his 2022 book, The Fourth Man. It’s about a secretive CIA unit composed of three women who began to review the agency’s blown cases in 1994. The evidence led them to create a profile of a possible spy or spies. Some of the leads would later turn out to match Hanssen, the FBI turncoat, though the women were instructed to disregard suspects in the bureau. Other leads, they told Baer, appeared to match one of their own bosses — Redmond, the senior CIA officer who had hunted down Ames. But after a series of conflicts with senior management, Baer writes, their superiors cut the three women off from access to the files they needed to pursue their leads. The only copy of their work disappeared, leaving them to fear someone had tampered with the investigation.

The book provoked intense backlash inside the intelligence community, in part because Baer named Redmond, who has never been charged with a crime. “Robert Baer’s book is hogwash, filled with mistakes and misinformation,” Redmond said in a written statement after its release. In an unprecedented public rebuttal, a cadre of former senior CIA officials came to Redmond’s defense. They pointed out numerous alleged errors in Baer’s book, disputed the conclusions and credibility of the three CIA investigators, and one even questioned whether the FBI seriously investigated anyone after Hanssen’s arrest in 2001.

But the FBI’s commitment to the hunt should not be in dispute, according to Szady. The bureau took the possibility of a “Fourth Man” seriously enough that it had profiled some of the CIA’s high-level officers. Szady, who became the FBI’s assistant director for counterintelligence in 2002, oversaw a series of probes and investigations during this period. All of them, he said, were based on credible leads and sources. “There was never a let up,” he said.

In the mid-2000s, the FBI received new intelligence reinforcing the idea that the KGB had a fourth mole in the highest ranks of the CIA. By 2005, the bureau had enough evidence to open a full, codenamed investigation into the new leads, and was trying to narrow the pool of suspects. But investigators ran into Washington politics when the director of national intelligence, John Negroponte, began considering one of their targets to head the National Counterintelligence Center. Szady had no choice but to inform Negroponte that the bureau was scrutinizing this senior intelligence official as a potential Russian spy. “The [FBI] Director agreed he should be briefed, [but] we weren’t saying anything about guilt” said Szady. “We told him ‘These are the facts’ and left it up to Negroponte.” (Negroponte was unavailable for comment.)

In an interview with POLITICO Magazine, Redmond — for the first time — confirmed that he was a subject of this FBI investigation and that he withdrew from the nomination so as not to taint the position. “I passed a message through one of [Negroponte’s] assistants that [he] should take me out of consideration,” Redmond said. “[I told him] I am damaged goods because there is this investigation of me.”

The ordeal pitted Szady’s FBI counterintelligence officials against Redmond, his former CIA counterpart — a man he liked and respected. It also exacerbated the lingering hostility from the Kelley investigation. Yet after months of aggressively chasing every possible lead, the FBI never found any hard evidence that Redmond had ever been a spy. They closed the investigation into him in 2007. “You can’t depend just on analysis,” like looking at compromised cases and source reporting, Szady said. “I learned my lesson on that with Kelley.”

Szady doesn’t believe Baer should have named Redmond in his book. Until there’s an indictment, he said, the bureau doesn’t want the subject or the public to know there’s an investigation. If something leaks, it could taint an innocent person’s reputation. The timing of Negroponte’s decision to consider Redmond, he added, was unfortunate. But investigating the veteran CIA officer was the only responsible thing to do, Szady maintained, based on the bureau’s leads and Redmond’s high-level access to sensitive operations. Even Redmond said he agrees: “I’m not pissed that the FBI investigated me. I would’ve investigated me. We lost a lot of cases and not all of them can be explained.”

Sellers, meanwhile, remains haunted by the mystery of the “Fourth Man.” In the decades since his arrest in 1986, he’s imagined what it was like when KGB executioners shot COWL and dozens of others like him in the basement of a Soviet prison. “It played like an unwanted movie in my mind,” he said. While researching his book during the 2000s, a period of detente with Russia, Sellers connected with many of the KGB men who had worked against the CIA back in the ’80s. He acquired thousands of pages of documents and dozens of hours of interviews. In one, a former KGB investigator hints that crucial information they used to identify COWL came from a source beyond Howard, Ames or Hanssen — seemingly evidence of a “Fourth Man.” Yet this clue, Sellers warned, could simply be part of an ongoing deception by the Russians. “Ninety-eight percent of what they tell you is true,” he said. “But it’s the other two percent that can get you in real trouble.”

Redmond said Russian intelligence is likely still spreading disinformation about the matter. During his debrief in 1994, Ames told one of the CIA’s key investigators, Jeanne Vertefeuille, that he and the KGB had planned to frame her as the spy in order to protect him. If the Russians were protecting yet another mole, a “Fourth Man,” Redmond said, they would have a good reason to frame him, too.

The CIA did not respond to a request for comment.

Today, 40 years after the “Year of the Spy,” the mystery of the “Fourth Man” remains. “All of the evidence, when taken as a whole picture, leaves too many compromises that can’t be attributed to known spies,” Szady said. “That’s my opinion, yes, there was a ‘Fourth Man.’”

And the FBI and CIA won’t know what damage this spy may have done to ongoing U.S. intelligence operations until they are caught and questioned. “That’s why there’s no statute of limitations on espionage,” Szady added.

‘We could be leaving the door wide open’

Szady retired in 2006 but the bureau remained so concerned about another spy that two FBI special agents interviewed a former CIA officer in 2019 about the matter, according to the officer. Three years later, before Baer’s book came out, officials from the bureau interviewed him as well, making the trek to his mountain home in a remote part of Colorado. The FBI investigators gave few details about what they were looking for and never mentioned anyone by name. “What their visit definitely did,” Baer said, “is tell me the FBI’s interest in the ‘Fourth Man’ is ongoing.”

Or it was. After several months of chaos and trepidation at the bureau, Patel has yet to publicly set a clear course for counterintelligence. The FBI appears to be moving to a regional command structure, according to The New York Times, but hasn’t announced further changes to its capacity to thwart spies, other than to suspend an analyst involved in investigating Russia’s 2016 election meddling.

“The FBI remains committed to counterintelligence investigations,” the bureau said in a statement to POLITICO Magazine. “Our adversaries continue their efforts to steal sensitive and often classified U.S. government and private sector information. The FBI will continue to be aggressive in detecting and disrupting their efforts.”

The Trump administration, meanwhile, continues to make friendly overtures to Moscow — reportedly halting the Pentagon’s offensive cyber operations against Russia, for instance. But few intelligence officials expect the Kremlin — let alone China or Iran — to suddenly stop spying on America. “They’re going to double or triple their efforts,” said Frank Montoya Jr., a retired FBI agent who was head of counterintelligence across all federal agencies from 2012 to 2014. “We could be leaving the door wide open.”

Szady is more optimistic. He agrees with Patel that the bureau needs to change to overcome perceptions of political bias after the investigations of Trump. Yet he says weakening counterintelligence or splitting it into another agency would be a mistake. “The bureau is still in the best position to be the lead agency to counter national security threats” alongside partners like the CIA, Szady said. As a law enforcement entity — and not a spy agency — the FBI is designed to make cases that are prosecutable in court while respecting the rights guaranteed in the Constitution.

Redmond, his former colleague — and former target of the investigation — concurs. Splitting out or weakening the FBI’s counterintelligence capability, he said, would be “fucking crazy” and a detriment to the type of long and intensive investigations that are so vital.

It took nine years of digging to arrest Ames and seven to get Hanssen. In the U.K., it took nearly 40 years to publicly unmask the last of the Cambridge Five, a network of spies that ravaged British intelligence at the height of the Cold War. Many of the key clues that helped cut through disinformation and deception to identify them came from Russian sources. Solving the mystery of the “Fourth Man,” former intelligence officials say, will likely hinge on another Russian source coming forward with new information.

But if Patel weakens or cripples the FBI’s counterintelligence capability, he’ll do the same to its ability to recruit, vet and protect such assets. “[The FBI and CIA] recruit sources all over the world,” said William Murray, a former CIA station chief and senior operations official. “They know what the penalty is going to be if they get caught. They’re going to get shot right in the back of the fucking head.”

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Donald Trump purges dozens of National Security Council officials

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Post date May 24, 2025

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EXPLAINED: What Putin’s ‘Buffer Zone’ Plan Means – and Why Ukraine’s Alarmed

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Post date May 23, 2025

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Alisa is the Head of News and a correspondent at Kyiv Post, where she leads the newsroom’s coverage of breaking events and global developments. With over seven years of experience in TV journalism, Alisa has reported on international and Ukrainian politics, making complex stories easier to understand. Back in September 2022, Alisa joined the Kyiv Post team.

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Woman Is Shot After Driving Onto C.I.A. Grounds, Officials Say

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U.S.|Woman Is Shot After Driving Onto C.I.A. Grounds, Officials Say

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A Burst Of Diplomacy Brings No Breakthrough On Russia’s War Against Ukraine. What’s Next?

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Post date May 21, 2025

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from Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty.

A flurry of intense diplomacy over Russia’s war against Ukraine, centered around the first direct peace talks between Kyiv and Moscow in three years and a long phone call between US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, ended earlier this week without a breakthrough.

The main objective set out by Ukraine and the West, a 30-day cease-fire, was not achieved.

Russian attacks continued during and after the talks, and Ukraine launched drone strikes on defense industry targets in Russia in the wake of the negotiations.

In a social media post after his two-hour-plus conversation with Putin, Trump suggested that the United States might be stepping back from efforts to broker a peace deal, four months after he entered office following a campaign in which he had said he could end the war in a day or two.

Now what?

With Russia’ full-scale invasion of Ukraine well into its fourth year, RFE/RL examines what to watch and where things may be headed.

More Talks? A Memorandum?

In his post on Truth Social after the phone call with Putin on May 19, Trump said negotiations between Russia and Ukraine “toward a cease-fire and more importantly, an end to the war” would start “immediately.” He mentioned the Vatican as a possible venue and concluded, “Let the process begin!”

There was no word from Kyiv or Moscow on a new meeting, but Finnish President Alexander Stubb said on May 21 that he sides were likely to hold “technical-level talks” next week, possibly at the Vatican.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who also spoke to Trump on May 19, said the next day that “Ukraine is ready for any negotiation format that delivers results,” but that “if Russia continues to put forward unrealistic conditions and undermine progress, there must be tough consequences.”

So far, Russia has given no sign that it is prepared to make any substantial compromise. It has often signaled the opposite, repeating long-stated positions that Ukraine has called unacceptable.

In his own statement after the call with Trump, Putin repeated his mantra about the need to eliminate the “root causes” of the war — blame for which, despite the fact that Russia launched the invasion unprovoked, he has continued to lay entirely at the feet of Kyiv and the West.

While Trump spoke of immediate negotiations, Putin focused on something Trump did not mention and was couched in the kind of ifs, ands, and buts that analysts say Putin has used to slow any move toward a truce. In the meanwhile, Moscow seeks to recruit more soldiers, build more weapons, and improve its position on the battlefield.

Russia, he said, is “ready to work with the Ukrainian side on a memorandum regarding a possible future peace treaty with the definition of a number of positions, such as, for example, the principles of settlement, the timing of a possible peace agreement, and so on.”

Continuing to reject an immediate truce, he said steps toward a solution could include “a possible cease-fire for a certain period of time if appropriate agreements are reached.”

Zelenskyy suggested that a bilateral memorandum could be a possibility, but that Ukraine would have to see what Russia is proposing before making any decisions.

‘The Crux’

Whatever the status of the negotiations process, there are several big barriers to progress. Territory is one of them.

Analysts often say that grabbing land is not Russia’s main goal — that what Putin really wants is the subjugation of Ukraine, and that aside from Crimea and perhaps part of the Donbas, he would be satisfied with any amount of land as long as the country and its government are Russia-friendly and firmly in Moscow’s grip.

Part of the litany of complaints Putin has used to justify the full-scale invasion is that the West has turned Ukraine into the ‘anti-Russia’ — though many say that Putin has done that himself, first by seizing Crimea in 2014 and fomenting war in the Donbas in 2014, and then by launching the full-scale invasion in 2022.

For now, though, territory is perhaps the most concrete sticking point between Kyiv and Moscow.

In September 2022, Putin baselessly claimed that four Ukrainian regions — Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhya, and Kherson — belong to Russia. Russian forces held only parts of those regions at the time, and that’s still the case.

But according to Ukrainian officials who spoke to multiple media outlets on condition of anonymity, the Russian delegation in Istanbul said there could be no cease-fire until Ukraine withdraws its troops from those regions — and demanded international recognition that they belong to Russia.

Ukraine has called those demands unacceptable, and Zelenskyy repeated this week that Kyiv will not withdraw troops from its own territory.

Russia’s progress toward taking the parts of those regions it does not hold has been slow and extremely costly. The capitals of Kherson and Zaporizhzhya remain in Kyiv’s hands.

“[The] Russian army will not be able to take control of the remaining parts of the four regions it has already occupied. First of all, this is a very large area, and even at last year’s pace, the Russian army would not be able to fully capture even one region — such as Donetsk,” said Yan Matveyev, a Russian military analyst who lives outside the country.

The prospect of Russia seizing the city of Kherson, which lies across the Dnieper River from the current positions of its forces, “seems absolutely fantastical and impossible,” Matveyev told Current Time on May 21.

At the same time, after a major counteroffensive fizzled in 2023, the chances of Ukraine regaining a substantial amount of land anytime soon are seen as very slim.

“Russia wants what they do not currently have and are not entitled to, and Ukraine wants what they cannot regain militarily,” US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on May 20. “And that’s been the crux of the challenge.”

Stepping Away?

Faced with the yawning gap between the Russian and Ukrainian positions, is the United States stepping away from the push for peace?

In his Truth Social post on May 19, Trump suggested that Ukraine and Russia might be left to their own devices, saying that the conditions for a cease-fire and an end to the war “will be negotiated between the two parties, as it can only be, because they know details of a negotiation that nobody else would be aware of.”

In comments to reporters in the Oval Office later the same day, though, Trump repeated the warning that Washington could step aside but indicated that it had not quite reached that point yet, and said that he still believes progress is possible.

“In my head I definitely have a red line” on when to stop pushing the sides to reach agreement, he said, “but I don’t want to say what it is because it makes negotiations so much more difficult.”

“It’s a European situation, it should be this way, but the previous administration got us involved. I feel something may happen,” Trump said. “If not, we’ll walk away and leave it to them.”

Sanctions And Support

At the same time, Trump also cited the chance for progress as a reason to avoid slapping additional sanctions on Russia for now, even as the European Union imposed its 17th package of sanctions on Moscow since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine and, along with Britain, considers what European leaders say would be “massive” new punitive measures.

Hitting Russia with new sanctions could “make the whole thing very much worse and now I still have a sense [that] things still can be done,” Trump said.

Asked whether the United States would continue to send Ukraine weapons in the future, Trump also indicated that would depend on what happens with the push for peace.

“We’ll have to see. I believe Putin still wants to do this,” he said, meaning end the war. “I think Putin has had enough.”

Many observers disagree, arguing that Putin is unlikely to make concessions in the absence of major setbacks on the battlefield or upheaval in Russia, neither of which is expected any time soon.

As it stands, a substantial test of Russia’s intentions — and of the West’s resolve — may come when and if Moscow lays out its position on the path to peace, or its conditions for a cease-fire, as part of the memorandum that Putin has proposed.

It’s unclear when that might happen.

“There are no deadlines [for that process] and there cannot be any,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on May 20. “It is clear that everyone wants to do this as quickly as possible, but, of course, the devil is in the details.”

A senior adviser to Zelenskyy, Mykhaylo Podolyak, predicted Russia’s demands won’t change.

“They will sign a memorandum that is exactly what one could most reasonably expect, he told RBC-Ukraine on May 21. “This includes removing the so-called ‘sources of war’ — which, in their view, means that Ukraine must cease to exist.”

RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service and Current Time contributed to this report

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Lawmaker demands explanation for Trump administration’s ouster of intelligence analysts

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Post date May 21, 2025

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DNI Gabbard ousts heads of top U.S. intelligence body
Removals follow assessment contradicting Trump deportation claim
Top Democrat demands proof of ousted officials alleged bias

WASHINGTON, May 14 (Reuters) – The top Democrat on the U.S. House intelligence committee on Wednesday called on Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard to produce proof of the alleged political bias that led her to oust the heads of the intelligence community’s highest analytical body.

Gabbard’s removal of the pair came after the National Intelligence Council produced an assessment contradicting the legal argument used by U.S. President Donald Trump to deport alleged members of the Venezuelan gang, Tren de Aragua.

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The Trump administration has used a claim that Tren de Aragua is coordinating its U.S. activities with the Venezuelan government of President Nicolas Maduro to invoke the 1789 Alien Enemies Act and justify deportations of alleged gang members to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador.

An ODNI spokesperson confirmed that Michael Collins, acting NIC chairman, and his vice chair, Maria Langan-Riekhof, were fired from those roles, adding that Gabbard “dismissed these individuals because they were unable to provide unbiased intelligence.” The spokesperson provided no examples of the alleged biased intelligence for which the pair were dismissed. Their ouster was first reported by Fox News.

Earlier, two sources familiar with the matter said on condition of anonymity that Gabbard, an ardent Trump loyalist, had removed them and sent them back to their home intelligence agencies.

One source said that she had yet to make a final decision on firing them entirely or bringing them back to the NIC.

Representative Jim Himes, the top Democrat on the House intelligence committee, said in a letter to Gabbard that she had failed to inform the congressional intelligence panels of her decision to oust Collins and Langan-Riekhof.

“According to anonymous sources cited in the Fox News story, you terminated these two individuals due to their supposed ‘political bias,’” Himes wrote. “This is an exceptionally serious allegation to make against career intelligence officers – and therefore an allegation that requires supporting evidence.”

He asked Gabbard give the committee that proof by May 21.

The NIC assessment released last week through a Freedom of Information Act request contradicted the administration’s claim about the gang’s connections to Venezuela’s government.

“While Venezuela’s permissive environment enables TDA to operate, the Maduro regime probably does not have a policy of cooperating with TDA and is not directing TDA movement to and operations in the United States,” the assessment concluded.

Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, accused Gabbard in a statement of “purging intelligence officials over a report that the Trump administration finds politically inconvenient.”

On a related matter, one source said that the CIA was “pushing back hard” against an effort by Gabbard to take over the drafting of the top-secret Presidential Daily Brief, the daily compendium of the most classified U.S. intelligence prepared for the president.

But a third source familiar with the issue cited to Reuters an internal CIA memo that said an agency team is working with Gabbard to move the office that prepares the brief and that a timetable was still being developed.

The ODNI spokesperson also denied that Gabbard was trying to take over the Presidential Daily Brief, and is instead moving it physically from the CIA to the ODNI “in a streamlining effort and a continuity of workforce.”

Reporting by Jonathan Landay and Erin Banco; Editing by Don Durfee, Caitlin Webber, Michael Perry and Deepa Babington

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The Narrow Bottleneck of Ukraine-Russia Reconciliation

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Post date May 20, 2025

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Executive Summary

Ukrainian-Russian reconciliation, as desirable as it might be, will not come about from wishful thinking and cannot be imposed. Well-meaning Western governments should avoid pressure for normalization in the short term.
Successful reconciliation will require profound political and social change in Russia, for which Ukraine’s post-Soviet democratization, and nation-building experience could serve as a template.
Reconciliation projects in other contexts have successfully relied on instrumental, historical, and structural mechanisms. However, each of these routes contains potential pitfalls for Ukraine and must be navigated carefully, if at all.
Unfortunately, past attempts to reconcile Russia with its neighbors and former subjects offer more cautionary tales than clear guides.
Initial steps toward genuine dialogue and eventual reconciliation could involve restorative justice, including holding accountable those responsible for crimes of war and aggression, providing reparations, repatriating abducted Ukrainian children, and collaborating on correcting distorted historical narratives.

Introduction

The end of Russia’s war in Ukraine — whether through Ukraine’s victory or defeat, a frozen conflict, or a negotiated settlement — will not automatically lead to lasting peace between the two largest powers in Eastern Europe. In the name of sustainable peace, Western leaders are likely to advocate for a rapid postwar reconciliation process, focusing on one or more of the following three reconciliation mechanisms:

Instrumental reconciliation through symbolic rapprochement and enhanced cooperation across various domains.
Historical reconciliation through transitional justice and truth-seeking.
Structural reconciliation through political and social reform.

However, rushing Ukraine into reconciliation without substantial changes in Russia risks increasing insecurity. Western policymakers should take a pragmatic approach to Russia’s imperial ambitions, carefully considering if and how to apply reconciliation methods, with a clear understanding of both historical and current contexts.

In essence, genuine reconciliation requires depth change in the Russian Federation, which may take generations and involve political reform and a shift in the prevailing mindset among the majority of its population. Insisting on democratic reforms in Russia is essential to avoid perpetuating insecurity.

In this, Russia may learn much from Ukraine, which serves as an invaluable case study for understanding post-Soviet democratic transformations, if it prioritizes alignment with the West. Until such reforms and shifts take root, however, Russia will likely maintain its imperialistic endeavor for decades, utilizing political, economic, and cultural influence to impede Ukraine’s democratic and economic development, reform efforts, European integration, NATO accession, and the further crystallization of Ukrainians’ national identity.

With these objectives and challenges in mind, this paper maps the minefields of potential Ukraine-Russia reconciliation. Key findings include:

Each category of reconciliation mechanisms — instrumental, historical, and structural — poses potential risks for Ukraine and (if the time ever comes) should be cautiously implemented, considering the nuanced details of the existing and historic context.
Given the need to contain Russia rather than seek normalization at any cost, ¹ it is unwise to impose reconciliation on Ukraine, which is actively resisting an imperial absorption. Reconciliation may not be realistic when the oppressed are fervently seeking independence without adequate political and economic safeguards. Hence, discussions on reconciliation in the West should approach Ukraine-Russia relations from a decolonial perspective.
Without fundamental changes in the Russian Federation, such as transitioning to democracy and the government’s acknowledgment of and commitment to human rights, only “thin” reconciliation can be expected — a coexistence marked by minimal to no trust, respect, and shared values.
At present, a small bottleneck for initiating reconciliation could potentially be alleviated through Ukraine-Russia dialogues and cooperation addressing issues such as prosecuting war criminals, transferring frozen Russian assets for Ukraine’s reconstruction, providing reparations to Ukraine, repatriating abducted Ukrainian children, and correcting distorted Russian historical narratives. However, such engagement will only be effective if it arises organically from the desires of Ukrainian and Russian societies. Attempts to impose such engagement from outside, especially on non-justice restoration-related topics, however well-meaning, will only shift the power balance in favor of Russia and deepen Ukrainian trauma.
Assessing Ukraine-Russia reconciliation prospects requires avoiding historical parallels, as every context is unique. The most accurate data for projections may be obtained from analyzing Russia’s previous reconciliation attempts with Ukraine and other post-Soviet states with which it has been at war. These instances unmistakably illustrate that over the past 30 years, the Russian Federation has consistently pursued an agenda of regional domination, if not of renewed imperialism. Consequently, the limited array of reconciliation mechanisms employed by Russia has primarily functioned to diminish the target countries’ autonomy and coerce them back into the orbit of Russian influence.

What Does “Reconciliation” Entail?

Reconciliation involves transforming relationships from mutual antagonism to “mutual recognition and acceptance” at best (“thick” reconciliation) or a non-conflict coexistence that maintains peace and prevents revenge at a minimum (“thin” reconciliation).² Achieving reconciliation is particularly challenging after massive human rights violations, like those committed during the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian war.

Reconciliation Mechanisms

While various typologies categorize reconciliation mechanisms, the following three overarching groups can be helpful:³

Instrumental mechanisms encompass public statements and symbolic gestures by leaders across political, social, cultural, and religious spheres, alongside efforts to bolster economic, cultural, and social cooperation.
Historical mechanisms span war crimes tribunals, truth commissions, and judicial procedures as transitional justice mechanisms. They also include memorials to honor victims and heroes and collaborative scholarly endeavors to document historical occurrences and reshape narratives.
Structural mechanisms anticipate reforms that will assist a country in embracing changes that ensure the impartial functioning of state institutions, respect for human rights and diversity, and political inclusion.

The complexities inherent in the Russo-Ukrainian relationship pose challenges for implementing these three mechanisms.

Additionally, our emphasis has been on horizontal reconciliation (repairing relations between individuals or groups) rather than vertical reconciliation (between authorities and the people). The latter is a consideration for Russian society if it chooses to revisit the experience of the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1956, where the personality cult and dictatorship of Joseph Stalin were denounced. Such a move may lead to some restoration of justice for political prisoners and victims of today’s Kremlin.

Context

There is no single model or toolkit for reconciliation; context is crucial.⁴

Despite Ukraine formally achieving independence in 1991, the Kremlin and some Russians have never fully accepted its sovereignty and territorial integrity.⁵ Over the centuries, peace between Ukraine and Russia has only occurred when Russia was weak or when Ukraine was under Russian occupation.⁶

The Kremlin distorts the reasons for Russia’s aggression against Ukraine in 2014. ⁷ However, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Canada, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Ireland have officially recognized Russia’s actions as genocide against Ukrainians through their national parliaments.⁸ Additionally, on July 13, 2022, the European Commission issued a collective statement supporting Ukraine’s actions at the International Court of Justice against Russia, based on the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.⁹

Russia’s aggression against Ukraine happened less than 100 years after another Kremlin-orchestrated genocide. The Holodomor, a grand famine in the 1930s, claimed up to 10 million Ukrainian lives.¹⁰ In the decades that followed, reconciliation between Russia and Ukraine meant silencing the horrors of genocide and enduring oppression. This denial “distorted the national mentality and produced or reinforced a variety of post-genocidal syndromes, ranging from historical amnesia to substance dependence to broken families….”¹¹ The failure to address and deter those actions laid the groundwork for the ongoing Russian atrocities.

Before Russia’s full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022, nearly half of Ukrainians had relatives or friends in Russia,¹² and over 20% were “Russian-speaking” (a term the Kremlin uses to imply a political identity and conflates linguistic identity with political allegiance¹³).¹⁴ However, it is essential not to be misled into thinking that there is a substantial foundation for post-atrocities reconciliation. Since the Soviet Union’s dissolution, Russia has waged a hybrid war against Ukraine, hindering its efforts to determine its own future.

The dynamics between the colonizer and the colonized, as evident in the Russo-Ukrainian relationship, pose significant challenges for reconciliation. Achieving meaningful reconciliation requires the colonizer to acknowledge the colonized as equals and recognize their right to self-determination, necessitating a profound political shift in Russia.

Russia has occasionally shown an interest in reconciling with its neighbors and former vassals, but this effort has been inconsistent and often driven by the desire to re-establish its dominance. Mikhail Gorbachev’s shift from the Brezhnev Doctrine, which allowed Soviet intervention to maintain the communist bloc, to the Sinatra Doctrine, which removed the threat of military intervention, paved the way for the liberations of 1989 and the reintegration of Central and Eastern Europe into the European family.¹⁵ However, when independence movements emerged within the Soviet Union, starting with the Baltics, Gorbachev hesitated.

After Gorbachev and the failed hard-line putsch that sought to oust him, post-Soviet Russia had an opportunity to change its approach. Boris Yeltsin supported Baltic independence to undermine Gorbachev and the Communist Party, accelerating Russia’s own move toward sovereignty. As a result, relations between Russia and the Baltic states were strong in the early 1990s.¹⁶ However, communist, nationalist, and populist politicians stoked resentment over the lost empire and feared the growing national identities of various nations, weaponizing the narrative of alleged oppression of Russian-speaking populations. This created friction between Moscow and the newly independent states, from Belarus and Moldova in the west to Tajikistan in the east, with Ukraine caught in the middle.¹⁷ Meanwhile, the two unjustified Chechen wars clearly demonstrated that Russia remained the true heir of the Soviet Union: using military force to suppress separatist movements and maintain control over its territories. By the time Yeltsin left office at the end of 1999, even Russia’s economic-minded reformers were talking about a “liberal empire.¹⁸

Initially, Putin used reconciliation as a tool of economic diplomacy, offering apologies for the 1956 and 1968 invasions and the Katyń massacre to improve relations with Budapest, Prague, and Warsaw. However, as Putin came increasingly to rely on nationalist rhetoric at home and on the rehabilitation of the memory of the Soviet empire in particular, the Kremlin saw confrontation with its former colonies as both inevitable and desirable.¹⁹ The Kremlin believed it needed political, economic, and military domination in its “near abroad” to feel secure at home, making genuine reconciliation impossible.²⁰

Reconciliation with an empire-minded aggressor is possible under one of the following scenarios:

Complete military defeat of the aggressor, followed by its democratization and pacification.
Gradual democratization of the aggressor through historical processes, a willingness to liberate colonies, and the ability to build cooperative relationships, though not always fully addressing past injustices.
An oppressive situation where victim states lack the resources and international support to resist imperial ambitions, leading to forced “thin” reconciliation and survival through subjugation or occupation.
The victim state’s ability to join security alliances or obtain security commitments from powerful countries to counter the aggressor and achieve “thin” reconciliation, depending on changing context.

For Ukraine to follow the path of Poland rather than Georgia or Belarus, it must be accepted into the European Union (EU) and NATO as soon as possible. Unfortunately, NATO membership remains a distant dream rather than an immediate goal, given the Alliance’s unwillingness to escalate tensions with Russia, despite Finland’s recent accession increasing NATO’s border with Russia.

Before exploring the threats to Ukraine within a classical reconciliation mechanism, it is helpful to review recent attempts at reconciliation between Ukraine and Russia.

Overview of Recent Ukraine-Russia Reconciliation Initiatives

Since Russia annexed Crimea and launched a war in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in 2014, the international community has implemented several initiatives aimed at establishing dialogue and facilitating reconciliation in Ukraine.²¹

Most of these initiatives focused on internal reconciliation rather than dialogue between the countries. For example, they aimed to foster understanding between citizens in occupied and government-controlled territories or between internally displaced persons (IDPs) and their host communities. The “Restoration of Governance and Reconciliation in Crisis-Affected Communities of Ukraine” project, co-led by UNDP, UN Women, the Swedish International Development Agency, and The Swiss Agency for Cooperation and Development, was funded by the European Union. Additionally, the “Break the Ice” initiative, supported by the US Embassy in Kyiv, worked on reconciling and reintegrating internally displaced children by providing a peaceful and safe environment for learning, developing, and strengthening resilience.²²

The Ukrainian government and civil society have also driven several reconciliation initiatives.²³ Launched in 2020, the National Platform for Reconciliation and Unity, aimed to demonstrate Ukraine’s commitment to peace and dialogue. Additionally, the International Centre for Policy Studies, a Ukrainian think tank, worked on the “Initiating the Participatory National Dialogue in Ukraine” project.²⁴ These are just a few of the many national and local initiatives that showcase Ukraine’s openness to constructive dialogue within its society and its respect for sovereignty.

Few initiatives openly recognized the Russian Federation as a party to the conflict and reconciliation efforts. For example, in 2018–19, the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission between Russia and Ukraine, with the Mediation of the European Union, drafted recommendations for peace between Russia and Ukraine and between Russia and the democratic world. Believing that the Russian Federation should one day be reintegrated into the broader family of democratic nations, the commission noted that Russia “must first carry out work within itself to integrate the democratic principles that it accepted theoretically after 1991…and repair the wrongs committed against its neighbors.”²⁵ The commission specifically underlined the need to “reject any naivety towards a State that seriously destabilizes the international order.”²⁶

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, drastically changed the context, leaving no room for manipulation and linguistic games in political discourse. Russia was recognized as a state sponsor of terrorism,²⁷ the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Putin,²⁸ and there are discussions about establishing a special tribunal for the crime of aggression against Ukraine.²⁹ The report of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine presents evidence of a wide range of violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law in Ukraine and Russia, committed on the order of the Russian government and supported by Russian citizens.³⁰ These war crimes include willful killings, attacks on civilians, unlawful confinement, torture, rape, forced transfers, and deportations of children, etc.³¹

As of June 2023, a majority (78%) of Ukrainians have close relatives or friends who have been injured or killed due to the Russian invasion.³² The war has created almost 7 million IDPs and 6 million refugees.³³ Meanwhile, no anti-war protest in Russia has managed to attract 100,000 people so far.³⁴ Ties between Ukrainians and their relatives, friends, colleagues, and acquaintances in Russia have been severely damaged since the full-scale invasion.³⁵

Instrumental mechanisms

Symbolic Gestures and Statements of Politicians and Civic Leaders

Statements of respect, apologies for harm suffered, or other symbolic gestures by political, social, cultural, and religious leaders are important for reconciliation.³⁶ Notable examples include German Chancellor Willy Brandt’s demonstration of respect to the victims of Nazis at the Warsaw Ghetto memorial in 1970 and the visits of US President Barack Obama to Hiroshima and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to Pearl Harbor in 2016.

“The two leaders’ visit will showcase the power of reconciliation that has turned former adversaries into the closest of allies,” the White House said in a statement about the 2016 visit by Obama and Abe to the USS Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor.³⁷ It is important to note that Germany and Japan were defeated in World War II and underwent significant internal changes (which to some are not complete), which helped overcome the ideological differences that had caused the conflicts before these gestures were possible.

Putin is unlikely to acknowledge the Ukrainian victims of the ongoing war.³⁸ It is doubtful that his successor will be substantially different, especially if power transitions within the current elite. Even the Russian opposition lacks consensus on strategies for restoring relations with Ukraine, as Russia’s imperialistic agenda remains popular among the general population.

Meanwhile, the Kremlin continues its nuclear threats and intensifies anti-Ukrainian and anti-Western propaganda.³⁹ First Deputy Chairman of the Russian State Duma’s Committee on International Affairs, Alexei Chepa, emphasized that reconciliation directly depends on developments at the front line.⁴⁰

Despite severe punishment in Russia for anti-war “propaganda,” there have been anti-war protests and statements by officers, some representatives of academia, intelligentsia, and civil society.⁴¹ Russian researcher Yury Terekhov identified over 100 anti-war initiatives in Russia and abroad, ranging from fundraising for the Ukrainian army’s needs to decolonization art projects.⁴²

Notable gestures include Russian lawyers endorsing the “Tribunal for Putin” and the support the Moscow-based human rights group Memorial has provided to a Ukrainian human rights defender and a prisoner of the Kremlin anti-fascist Maxym Butkevych.⁴³ An Anti-War Committee member and businessman, Yevgeny Chichvarkin, provided $2.5 million in aid to Ukraine.⁴⁴ Russian opposition leader Vladimir Kara-Murza’s statements led to the first instance of the strictest punishment for anti-war rhetoric under new Russian legislation: 25 years in prison.⁴⁵

However, such efforts are overshadowed by pro-war declarations, silence, and the indifference of the majority of the Russian population.⁴⁶ In the near future, only Russian civil society actors who have not stayed silent and indifferent can take the first small step toward reconciliation with Ukraine. They can initiate a “hard talk” with Russian society, challenge current historical narratives, promote justice for victims, and condemn perpetrators, thereby setting the stage for the application of historical reconciliation mechanisms.

This would also require extensive efforts to enforce the rule of law, which involves structural reforms. For reconciliation within Russia, it is essential to bring justice to victims of the regime, like tortured anti-war poet Artem Kamardin and artist Sasha Skochilenko.⁴⁷ An honest internal discussion within the Russian society should precede any reconciliation efforts between Russians and the oppressed peoples.

In addition to addressing individual criminal guilt for war crimes in Ukraine, promoting discussions about the collective political responsibility of the Russian people is essential. The late US historian and political philosopher Hannah Arendt demonstrated how building any dictatorship requires the integration and normalization of that regime in the minds of its citizens. She emphasized that it is humans’ duty to prevent evil.⁴⁸ Both Arendt and the late German-Swiss psychiatrist and philosopher Karl Jaspers believed that society can be changed only through the acceptance of political responsibility.⁴⁹ Most Ukrainians believe this too.

One of the few Russian intellectuals who agrees with this idea is Vladimir Sorokin. “As a Russian, I unquestionably share in the collective responsibility for the unleashed war. However, I am also compelled to ask myself personally: what specific actions did I neglect to prevent this war?”, Sorokin said in an interview with Radio Liberty. “I believe every sensible person asks themselves the same question. This guilt will continue to grow even after the war ends; we will carry it within ourselves. We Russians will all bear this bitter burden. Each of us will carry our own stone on our back. The weight and size of each stone will be determined individually. But we are all culpable, not just Putin and his team. The issue lies in the fact that, similar to the Stalinist era, the regime is upheld by the existence of millions who share the same consciousness, ethics, and rhetoric as figures like Stalin or Putin.”⁵⁰

The Role of The Church

The church played a pivotal role in initiating German-Polish reconciliation in the 1950s.⁵¹ In Ukraine and Russia, both multi-confessional societies, various religious organizations could potentially contribute to promoting repentance and forgiveness. However, it is unlikely to involve the Russian Orthodox Church or the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, which are the largest denominations in both countries.⁵²

The moral leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) is questionable. According to a Royal United Services Institute report, the ROC supports Russian information operations, and its priests are recruited by Russian special services. Patriarch Kirill, known for his KGB past, supported the Russian invasion of Ukraine, stating that dying in war “washes away the sins.” This statement starkly contradicts the Sixth Commandment, “Thou shalt not kill.” Moreover, he claims that the war in Ukraine is defensive and that the people of Ukraine have been seduced by Western “forces of evil”. This stance undermines the ROC’s potential role in fostering genuine reconciliation.

Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the spiritual head of the world’s Orthodox Christians, said that the ROC shares responsibility for the conflict in Ukraine. However, he also expressed his readiness to assist in Russia’s postwar “spiritual regeneration.”⁵³

The communists established the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP) to control believers within Ukraine and to participate in foreign intelligence activities.⁵⁴ Currently, the UOC-MP is not only formally affiliated with the ROC but also infiltrated by Russian intelligence officers and collaborators.⁵⁵ Some priests have even participated in laying the ground for the acceptance of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and later provided Ukrainian armed forces’ positions to the enemy.

Given the political nature of the UOC-MP, Ukraine had to balance ensuring religious freedom with safeguarding national security.⁵⁶ Since the onset of Russia’s full-scale aggression, based on Ukraine Security Service reports, 68 criminal cases have been launched against members of the UOC-MP, including 14 involving metropolitans. These include20 cases of treason, collaborationism, and aiding Russia, 18 cases of incitement to religious hatred, firearms sales, and child pornography distribution.⁵⁷ As a result, 19 priests have lost their Ukrainian citizenship.⁵⁸

The ROC is unlikely to find a reconciliation partner in the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU), which was granted autocephaly (self-governorship) by Constantinople in October 2018.⁵⁹ This recognition as the sole canonical successor of the Kyiv Metropolitanate from the 10th to 12th centuries, the church of the Kyivan Rus era, restores historical justice and counters the Kremlin’s distorted history. The Kyiv Metropolitanate was under the direct jurisdiction of Constantinople from the adoption of Christianity in 988 until the late 17th century, when it was non-canonically annexed by the Moscow Patriarchate.

The ROC, the largest patriarchate in the Orthodox world, effectively supports genocide.⁶⁰ The “Russian world” concept incorporates various Christian ideas manipulated to serve the Kremlin’s political agenda. Therefore, any attempts by the Russian regime to use the ROC to hide current political strategies with a distorted version of reconciliation should be rejected.⁶¹

Strengthening Economic Cooperation

After the Soviet Union dissolved, Russia consistently used economic cooperation to influence Ukraine’s domestic politics. Significant examples include the 2010 “Kharkiv Agreements,” which extended Russia’s Black Sea Fleet presence in Ukraine by 25 years in exchange for a 30% discount on Russian gas and a $15 billion loan.⁶² Another instance was Russia’s obstruction of Ukraine signing the Association Agreement with the EU in 2013.⁶³ Russia imposed export restrictions and warned that signing the agreement would be “suicidal” for Ukraine. ⁶⁴

Russia uses debt relief, bank bailouts, preferential trade agreements, oil and gas export discounts, nuclear power cooperation, and extensive commercial engagement to advance both its economic interests and global political influence. By buying out local politicians, Russia introduces political corruption and weakens democratic institutions in its “partner” countries. In 2022, Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council banned 11 political parties with ties to Russia in response to national security threats.⁶⁵

Ukraine’s efforts to reduce economic dependence on Russia have come at a high human cost, with hundreds killed during the Revolution of Dignity and thousands more in the ongoing war. Since 2014, Ukraine has actively shifted its main trading partner from Russia to the EU.⁶⁶ In 2022, sanctions and the freezing of asset further reduced Russian influence.⁶⁷ If Russia becomes involved in the reconstruction of Ukraine beyond the seized assets and reparations, it may undermine Ukraine’s efforts to eliminate harmful Russian influence.

Some optimists view the EU as a model of successful reconciliation through economic cooperation. However, it is important to note that the EU’s foundation was built on the ruins of former empires. The last empire, partially democratized and demilitarized, acknowledged its faults, faced accountability in international tribunals, revised historical memory extensively, and paid reparations. Although the EU initially aimed to create a unified economic space, shared values have been fundamental to its cohesion.

For reconciliation to be successful, the demand must come from the conflicting groups themselves. External facilitators should remain impartial and objective, as any hidden economic or political motivations can retraumatize victims and undermine the reconciliation process by fostering distrust and frustration.

Culture as a Soft but Deadly Power

The Kremlin skillfully uses culture as a weapon to destabilize societies, colonize and exert influence on other nations’ identities, and strengthen puppet regimes.⁶⁸ Russian culture, heavily politicized, serves as a potent tool for both domestic and international influence.⁶⁹

“We are all militarists and imperialists. War is the self-assertion of the nation,” Mikhail Piotrovsky, director of the Hermitage Museum, told Rossiyskaya Gazeta. He added: “Our latest exhibitions abroad are simply a powerful cultural offensive. If you want, a ‘special operation’ of sorts.”⁷⁰

Contemporary Russian culture supports territorial expansion, justifying it by the “infinity of the Russian world.”⁷¹ This stems from a desire to restore perceived “lost greatness” after “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [XX] century”⁷² — the collapse of the Soviet Union, an event uniquely felt as a loss by Russians among the newly established countries — and to emphasize Russia’s “difference” from the West.

In Ukraine, Putin’s objectives extend beyond controlling territory to erasing Ukrainian culture and identity.⁷³ Since the era of the Russian Empire, Ukrainian culture has been depicted as secondary, rural, and supplementary to the Great Russian culture. An example is the poem “On the Independence of Ukraine” by the late Soviet dissident Joseph Brodsky, which was never officially published.⁷⁴

“Brodsky’s poem sheds light on a painful truth that many in the West are still struggling to grasp,” writes Kate Tsurkan, a Ukraine-based US writer and chief editor of Apofenie Magazine. “While Russian literary figures have traditionally been lionized by Western audiences as symbols of a freer Russia, their readiness to take a stand against the autocracy of the Russian state does not necessarily make them natural allies of the Ukrainian national project. Indeed, Ukrainians have long noted that Russian liberalism ends at the Ukrainian border.”⁷⁵

Cultural sociologist Pascal Guillen argues that Ukrainians require a culture of rejection because the decolonization of Ukraine remains incomplete.

Cultural projects that question the moral aspects of Russian leadership and society’s actions in the ongoing war can help both reconciliation and counter the Kremlin’s cultural offensive. This offensive is reflected in state-sponsored productions like the controversial drama “The Witness.”⁷⁶ This film, the first feature about the 18-month-old invasion, depicts Ukrainian troops as violent neo-Nazis who torture and kill their own people.

The main reason for the significant break in ties between Ukrainians and Russians after February 2022 is deep ideological differences. Values like the love for freedom clash with imperialism, humanism contends with indifference or aggression, and the pursuit of justice and truth confronts denial.

One of the few meaningful avenues for social cooperation is the joint effort to locate Ukrainian children kidnapped by Russians and subsequently return them to Ukraine. The Ukrainian peace plan, presented by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, along with the return of all territories, includes Point 4 — to return of all prisoners of war and civilian Ukrainians, including deported children. Ukrainian Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets, along with various state agencies, human rights organizations, and volunteers, are working to track and bring children back through the newly established International Coalition for the Return of Ukrainian Children. The identities of the Russian participants in these efforts are kept secret to protect them and ensure their work can continue.

Ukraine reports nearly 19,000 deported children, while Russian ombudsman Maria Lvova-Belova, who is the target of an ICC arrest warrant for the unlawful deportation and transfer of children from Ukraine, claims that more than 700,000 Ukrainian children have been taken to Russia since the beginning of the war.⁷⁷

Unless the ideological barrier is removed, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine will remain a clash of worldviews and mindsets, not just about territory or material interests. This makes it much harder to resolve.

Historical Mechanisms

Historical mechanisms can be crucial for reconciliation between Russia and Ukraine. They help ensure accountability, restore justice for victims, prevent future conflicts, and foster Russia’s democratic development. Discussing trauma itself can be therapeutic.

These mechanisms include war crimes tribunals, truth commissions, and other judicial procedures as part of transitional justice. They also involve memorials honoring victims and heroes, collaborative scholarly endeavors to research and document historical occurrences, and the creation or reshaping of narratives.⁷⁸

Large-group identity theory, which examines the persistent sameness of tens of millions of individuals who may never meet, provides valuable insights into how collective identities are transmitted across generations through narratives of “chosen glories and chosen traumas.”⁷⁹ Vamil D. Volkan describes large-group identity as the subjective experience of many persons linked by a sense of their own uniqueness.⁸⁰ The Russian collective identity is tied to a distorted view of Russia’s past and present, reflected in concepts such as the Russian world, Eurasianism, the Great Russian Empire, and the victorious Soviet Union.⁸¹ The view sees Western values as sinful and hostile, contributing to the ideological divide.

Discrediting narratives that justify Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the supposed superiority of the Russian nation is essential for reconciliation. Without this, the “abuses [they committed] remain uncontested and effectively reinforce an equivalence between violators and the violated, with each ‘side’ having its own justifications or interpretation of what happened,” writes Ernesto Verdeja, associate professor of political science and peace studies in the Keough School of Global Affairs at the University of Notre Dame.⁸²

Before setting up any dialogue platforms that might re-traumatize Ukrainians, grassroots initiatives in Russia should focus on uncovering the broader truth about Russia’s treatment of its neighbors. Similar to the work done by Memorial, these efforts can help rethink Russian collective identity and address collective political responsibility.

Joint initiatives could later promote individual reconciliation and lay the groundwork for national reconciliation. This could involve truth commissions, collaborative historical research, and awareness campaigns on the crimes committed by the Russian army and leadership, including art projects. A truth commission should explore not only the harms inflicted from 2014 to the present but also Soviet-era and other historical events. In Ukraine, the Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance is already working with Soviet-era documents.

A distorted interpretation of history fosters Russians’ sense of superiority over Ukrainians.⁸³ Processes like de-Stalinization, de-Sovietization, and, notably, de-Putinization can help Russia overcome the damage inflicted by decades of propaganda. This is essential for decolonizing Ukraine and other oppressed nations and democratizing Russia, fostering long-term peace in Europe and Asia, and integrating Russia into the Western world.

Addressing individual culpability requires drawing on the experiences of international and hybrid criminal courts, especially regarding current Russian leaders and propagandists.⁸⁴

Some advocate for societal forgetfulness to expedite reconciliation, but this overlooks the power dynamics and the continued influence of perpetrators.((Verdeja, Unchopping a Tree.)) “Public forgetting instrumentalizes victims by signaling that their moral value is less important than stability and peace,” writes Verdeja.⁸⁵

Russian civil society committed a significant error by not confronting the past. At the Russian human rights group Memorial’s founding conference in 1989, the decision to refrain from prosecuting KGB crimes undermined efforts to establish a framework for changing societal values.⁸⁶

Unearthing the past is imperative for shaping reconciliation.⁸⁷ It acts as a political litmus test for Russian decision-makers and civil society. Historical narratives play a pivotal role in changing beliefs, attitudes, and motivations, laying the groundwork for initiating reconciliation processes.⁸⁸

Structural Mechanisms

Backward-looking historical mechanisms supplement forward-looking structural mechanisms crucial for reconciliation. Structural reforms aimed at fostering reconciliation should pave the way for Russia’s democratic development, sustainable economic growth, social equality, inclusion, protection of minorities, and the assurance of political participation rights. If Russia can confront its past and align itself with the Western world, Ukraine can provide valuable insights into democratic transformations in a post-Soviet context.

Key to reconciliation are reforms targeting corruption, decentralization, lustration, and decommunization. Ukraine has addressed corruption through independent anti-corruption mechanisms, electronic procurement systems, and AI-powered risk monitoring tools. Despite ongoing challenges, Ukraine ranks higher than Russia on Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index.⁸⁹

Effective decentralization is critical for redistributing resources and power. Ukraine has implemented decentralization reform, but caution is needed to prevent calls for federalization, which align with Russia’s efforts to weaken Ukraine.⁹⁰ Russia’s federalism experience shows it does not necessarily lead to genuine decentralization.

Decentralization also plays a role in safeguarding the rights of national minorities oppressed in Russia. For instance, as of 2019, there were approximately two million Ukrainians in Russia with no Ukrainian schools. Since the occupation of Crimea in 2014, Ukrainian-language education has dwindled, contrasting with Ukraine, where many students study Russian.⁹¹ Russian Deputy Minister of Education Alexander Bugaev stated that children in the occupied territories would study the Ukrainian language as an elective subject, with Russian being the primary language of instruction.⁹² Meanwhile, even after the full-scale invasion, nearly 450,000 schoolchildren in Ukraine study the Russian language in over 4,000 schools, with 10% of them having Russian as the primary language of instruction.⁹³

Considering de-Russification as a matter of national security for Ukraine and the absence of any threat to Russia in ensuring the rights of national minorities, the genuine development of Ukrainian language and culture in the Russian Federation could be a positive gesture for reconciliation. The idea of Russian as a second state language in Ukraine lacks support, as most Ukrainians reject claims of language rights oppression.⁹⁴

Decommunization is pivotal in the post-Soviet space,⁹⁵ intertwining with memory policies. While currently equated with fascism and the resurgence of far-right sentiments in Russia, it offers opportunities for cooperation among political elites and civil societies.

Another area that could facilitate Ukrainian-Russian dialogue is sharing experiences regarding lustration. Lustration involves restrictions on high-ranking officials in the former communist regime, former secret police agents, and sometimes all members of communist parties who undermined state interests or human rights from public office. It has been pivotal in Eastern Europe since the late 1980s, with countries like Ukraine, Poland, and Romania implementing it to varying extents.

These initiatives illustrate pathways for Ukrainian-Russian dialogue, focusing on shared experiences in combating corruption, enhancing decentralization, and addressing historical legacies like decommunization and lustration.

Conclusions

A quarter century passed after the end of World War II before German Chancellor Willy Brandt kneeled at the Warsaw Ghetto. It is unrealistic to expect Russian leadership to make a similar gesture soon, and equally unrealistic to expect Ukraine to once again ignore its trauma and hastily seek reconciliation with a state that has committed genocide against Ukrainians twice in less than a century.

Separation might be a fairer solution than forcing adversaries to reconcile, especially when the oppressed group seeks independence and lacks viable prospects for political and economic protections in the current setup.⁹⁶ Hence, discussing Ukrainian-Russian reconciliation from a decolonial perspective in the West becomes crucial.⁹⁷

In 2018–19, the Truth, Justice, and Reconciliation Commission between Russia and Ukraine, with the Mediation of the European Union, put forth recommendations for peace between Russia and Ukraine, as well as between Russia and the democratic world. With the belief that Russia should eventually be reintegrated into the broader family of democratic nations, the commission emphasized that Russia “must first carry out work within itself to integrate the democratic principles that it accepted theoretically after 1991… and repair the wrongs committed against its neighbors.”⁹⁸ The commission specifically emphasized the necessity to “reject any naivety towards a State that seriously destabilizes the international order.”⁸⁰

When evaluating the potential for reconciliation between Ukraine and Russia, we deliberately refrain from drawing direct historical parallels, recognizing the uniqueness of each context. However, a more nuanced understanding can be gained by examining Russia’s interactions with other nations it has conflicted with in the post-Soviet era.

Russia’s past conflicts with Chechnya, Moldova, and Georgia have not seen the Kremlin apologize or acknowledge wrongdoing. Moscow has consistently employed economic, cultural, and historical tools to assert control over political processes, indicating a persistent pattern.

Given this pattern, it seems unlikely that Russia will change its approach toward Ukraine after the current hostilities end. Russia appears committed to maintaining a strategy that relies on economic, cultural, and historical influence to exert control. Ukrainian journalist Vitaliy Portnikov underscored the complexity of the challenges ahead, suggesting that reconciliation between Russians and Ukrainians may be possible from a historical perspective but remains unlikely as long as the average Russian citizen views the lands of modern Ukraine as part of Russia.⁹⁹

The colonialist and colonized dynamics in Russo-Ukrainian relations complicate reconciliation. Historical examples from former European empires demonstrate that true reconciliation often required the collapse and redefinition of political and social agreements with former colonies, albeit with mixed success. Without such a transformative shift, any cease-fire might only offer a temporary pause before renewed aggression.

Acknowledgments

I wish to express sincere gratitude to the Ukrainian Armed Forces and the Ukrainian people for their courageous resistance against a longstanding enemy, ensuring Ukraine’s sovereignty. I am deeply thankful to Ukraine’s allies for vital military, financial and humanitarian support in the times of major geopolitical shifts.

I also extend heartfelt appreciation to the Center for European Policy Analysis, Johns Hopkins University, and the Ax:Son Johnson Foundation for their invaluable support of Ukrainian academics during the war. Special thanks to Alina Polyakova, Sam Greene, SaraJane Rzegocki, Sarah Krajewsky, Edward Lucas, and Leon Hartwell.

Lastly, I am grateful to those whose inspiration led to this research topic, and I trust they will find its insights enlightening.

About the Author

Elena Davlikanova is a Democracy Fellow with the Center for European Policy Analysis.

Davlikanova’s work is focused on Ukraine and Russia’s domestic issues and their effects on global peace. She also studies historical, social, economic, and cultural narratives about Ukraine and Russia, their connection to on-the-ground situations, and their influence on decision-making practices and processes. She is an experienced researcher, who in 2022 conducted the studies “The Work of Ukrainian Parliament at Wartime” and “Understanding Ukraine: The Battle of Narratives.”

Since 2011, Davlikanova’s professional life has been mainly devoted to working for the National Democratic Institute and the Friedrich Ebert Foundation Office in Ukraine. There she contributed to the democratic development of Ukraine by implementing national level projects for the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of power, as well as to Ukraine’s European integration. Her interests also include promoting gender equality. Among other initiatives, she facilitated the compilation of the book “100+ Stories of Women and Girls from Russia’s War against Ukraine.” Davlikanova received her Candidate of Sciences degree (Ph.D.) in management from the Sumy State University in Ukraine. Her work was based on the facilitated by her national level project aimed at education reform. She is also an Associate Professor in the International Economic Relations Department at Sumy State University.

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“Заявление Amnesty International по России. Власти используют новое уголовное законодательство, чтобы остановить критику войны России против Украины,” [Amnesty International statement on Russia. Authorities use new criminal law to stop criticism of Russia’s war against Ukraine], Amnesty International, September 2, 2022, https://eurasia.amnesty.org/2022/09/02/zayavlenie-amnesty-international-po-rossii-vlasti-ispolzuyut-novoe-ugolovnoe-zakonodatelstvo-chtoby-ostanovit-kritiku-vojny-rossii-protiv-ukrainy/; “Persecution for anti-war views,” OVD-Info, accessed April 23, 2024, https://antiwar.ovd.info/en; “Dozens of Russian Anti-War Picketers Detained – Reports,” The Moscow Times, February 24, 2022, https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022/02/24/dozens-of-russian-anti-war-picketers-detained-reports-a76559;Vladimir Isachenkov and Sasha Litvinova, “Anti-war sentiment grows in Russia as troops close in on Ukrainian capital,” PBS/Associated Press, February 26, 2022, https://ghostarchive.org/archive/39b18; Appeal of the “Обращение ‘Общероссийского офицерского собрания’ к президенту и гражданам Российской Федерации. Обзор [All-Russian Officers’ Assembly” to the President and citizens of the Russian Federation]”, Dzen/Obektivno-Subektivno, February 8, 2022, <a href=”https://dzen.ru/a/YgKAuf2baEpW6gEh;” rel=”nofollow”>https://dzen.ru/a/YgKAuf2baEpW6gEh;</a> “Открытое письмо российских ученых и научных журналистов против войны с Украиной” [An open letter from Russian scientists and science journalists against the war with Ukraine], T-Invariant, January 4, 2023, https://www.t-invariant.org/2022/02/we-are-against-war/; “Две тысячи российских художников, искусствоведов и архитекторов выступили против войны с Украиной” [Two thousand Russian artists, art historians and architects opposed the war with Ukraine], Meduza, February 26, 2022, https://meduza.io/news/2022/02/26/dve-tysyachi-rossiyskih-hudozhnikov-iskusstvovedov-i-arhitektorov-vystupili-protiv-voyny-s-ukrainoy; “Остановить войну с Украиной!” [Stop the war with <a href=”http://Ukraine%21%5D%2CChange.org” rel=”nofollow”>Ukraine!],Change.org</a>, started by Lev Ponamarev, February 24, 2022, https://shorturl.at/Fky4E . []
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Ksenia Polskaya, “‘Трибунал для Путина’: российские юристы начали действовать” [“Tribunal for Putin”: Russian lawyers began to act], Deutsche Welle, June 9, 2023, https://www.dw.com/ru/tribunal-dla-putina-rossijskie-uristy-nacali-dejstvovat/a-65862858; Elena Davlikanova, “Revenge Russian-Style,” Center for European Policy Analysis, March 17, 2023, <a href=”https://cepa.org/article/revenge-russian-style/” rel=”nofollow”>https://cepa.org/article/revenge-russian-style/</a>. []
This is Ossetian (Russian norms!), “‘Смелость – это постепенный процесс.’ Чичваркин о войне, русском паспорте и винном бизнесе” [“Courage is a gradual process.” Chichvarkin about the war, the Russian passport and the wine business], July 6, 2023, YouTube video, 1:37:31, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPbbMOe6928. []
Rob Picheta et al., “Kremlin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza given 25 years in prison for condemning war in Ukraine,” CNN, April 17, 2023, <a href=”https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/17/europe/vladimir-kara-murza-sentencing-russia-intl/index.html” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/17/europe/vladimir-kara-murza-sentencing-russia-intl/index.html</a>. []
Elena Leksina, “Кто из знаменитостей поддержал военную операцию на Украине?” [Which celebrity supported the military operation in Ukraine?], Vzgliad, March 2, 2022, https://vz.ru/question/2022/3/2/1146626.html; “Кто хочет жертв? Обращение писателей России по поводу специальной операции нашей армии в Донбассе и на территории Украины.” [Who wants victims? Appeal of Russian writers regarding the special operation of our army in the Donbass and on the territory of Ukraine.], Literature Newspaper, February 28, 2022, <a href=”https://lgz.ru/article/-8-6822-23-02-2022/kto-khochet-zhertv/?fbclid=IwAR27z1_PswYs0GaYablXZ5_cglyEtEWirkxNKEMxKgMzLC-eR5HQSTQQrRM;” rel=”nofollow”>https://lgz.ru/article/-8-6822-23-02-2022/kto-khochet-zhertv/?fbclid=IwAR27z1_PswYs0GaYablXZ5_cglyEtEWirkxNKEMxKgMzLC-eR5HQSTQQrRM;</a> Andrey Arkhangelsky, “Позволили злу совершаться. Андрей Архангельский – о бездействии” [Allowed evil to happen. Andrey Arkhangelsky – about inaction], Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, September 1, 2022, <a href=”https://www.svoboda.org/a/pozvolili-zlu-sovershatjsya-andrey-arhangeljskiy-o-bezdeystvii/31998768.html” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.svoboda.org/a/pozvolili-zlu-sovershatjsya-andrey-arhangeljskiy-o-bezdeystvii/31998768.html</a>. []
“Russian poet Artem Kamardin, tortured and raped by police, charged with incitement to hatred,” Novaya Gazeta Europe, March 9, 2023, https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2023/03/09/russian-poet-artem-kamardin-tortured-and-raped-by-police-charged-with-incitement-to-hatred-en-news; “Trial of Russian Artist for Anti-War Supermarket Protest Begins,” Moscow Times, December 16, 2022, <a href=”https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022/12/15/trial-of-russian-artist-for-anti-war-supermarket-protest-begins-a79711″ rel=”nofollow”>https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022/12/15/trial-of-russian-artist-for-anti-war-supermarket-protest-begins-a79711</a>. []
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“Конфесійна та церковна належність громадян України (січень 2020р.)” [Confessional and Church Independence of the Citizens of Ukraine (January 2020)], Razumkov Center, February 3, 2020, https://razumkov.org.ua/napriamky/sotsiologichni-doslidzhennia/konfesiina-ta-tserkovna-nalezhnist-gromadian-ukrainy-sichen-2020r; Anton Skripunov, “‘Индекс веры’: сколько на самом деле в России православных” [“Faith Index”: how many Orthodox Christians are there in Russia], RIA News, August 23, 2017, <a href=”https://ria.ru/20170823/1500891796.html” rel=”nofollow”>https://ria.ru/20170823/1500891796.html</a>. []
Andrius Sytas, “Ecumenical patriarch: Russian Church shares blame for ‘crimes’ in Ukraine,” Reuters, March 22, 2023, <a href=”https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ecumenical-patriarch-russian-church-shares-blame-crimes-ukraine-2023-03-22/” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ecumenical-patriarch-russian-church-shares-blame-crimes-ukraine-2023-03-22/</a>. []
“‘Московський патріархат створювався як структура, яка контролюватиме вірян всередині України і займатиметься зовнішньою розвідкою,’ — Коваленко” [“The Moscow Patriarchate was created as a structure that would control believers inside Ukraine and engage in foreign intelligence” — Kovalenko], Ukrainian Radio, November 27, 2022, <a href=”http://www.nrcu.gov.ua/news.html?newsID=100181″ rel=”nofollow”>http://www.nrcu.gov.ua/news.html?newsID=100181</a>. []
Ludmila Zhernovskaya, “Данилов прокомментировал выселение УПЦ МП из Киево-Печерской Лавры” [Danilov commented on the eviction of the UOC-MP from the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra], UNIAN, March 17, 2023, <a href=”https://www.unian.net/society/vyselenie-upc-mp-iz-kievo-pecherskoy-lavry-danilov-prokommentiroval-12182901.html” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.unian.net/society/vyselenie-upc-mp-iz-kievo-pecherskoy-lavry-danilov-prokommentiroval-12182901.html</a>. []
Elena Davlikanova, “Ukraine’s Quest for Freedom of Religion,” Center for European Policy Analysis, December 20, 2023, <a href=”https://cepa.org/article/ukraines-quest-for-freedom-of-religion/” rel=”nofollow”>https://cepa.org/article/ukraines-quest-for-freedom-of-religion/</a>. []
Dmitry Mikhailov, “Від співпраці з РФ до продажу дитячого порно. З початку війни СБУ викрила 68 кліриків УПЦ МП – Дмитро Михайлов” [From Collaboration with Russia to Selling Child Pornography: Since the beginning of the war, the SBU has exposed 68 clerics of the UOC-MP], Suspilne, October 4, 2023, https://suspilne.media/586931-vid-spivpraci-z-rf-do-prodazu-ditacogo-porno-z-pocatku-vijni-sbu-vikrila-68-klirikiv-upc-mp []
Volodymyr Ivakhnenko, “Церковь, где нет любви”. Почему УПЦ Московского патриархата не верят в Украине” [“The Church Where There Is No Love”: Why the UOC-MP Does Not Believe in Ukraine], Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty, April 5, 2023, <a href=”https://www.svoboda.org/a/tserkovj-gde-net-lyubvi-pochemu-upts-moskovskogo-patriarhata-ne-veryat-v-ukraine/32350981.html” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.svoboda.org/a/tserkovj-gde-net-lyubvi-pochemu-upts-moskovskogo-patriarhata-ne-veryat-v-ukraine/32350981.html</a> []
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Ksenia Luchenko, “Why the Russian Orthodox Church Supports the War in Ukraine,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, January 31, 2023, <a href=”https://carnegieendowment.org/politika/88916″ rel=”nofollow”>https://carnegieendowment.org/politika/88916</a>. []
Volodymyr Turchynovskyy, “Reconciliation Will Be Ukraine’s Next Serious Battle with Russia,” UkraineAlert, Atlantic Council, May 19, 2016, <a href=”https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/reconciliation-will-be-ukraine-s-next-serious-battle-with-russia/” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/reconciliation-will-be-ukraine-s-next-serious-battle-with-russia/</a>. []
Charles Recknagel, “Promises, Promises: Moscow’s Record Of Broken Aid Pledges,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, December 17, 2013, https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-promises-aid-unfilled/25203488.html []
Steven Pifer, “Why Did Ukraine’s Yanukovych Give in to Russian Pressure on EU Deal?” The Brookings, December 2, 2013, <a href=”https://www.brookings.edu/articles/why-did-ukraines-yanukovych-give-in-to-russian-pressure-on-eu-deal/” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.brookings.edu/articles/why-did-ukraines-yanukovych-give-in-to-russian-pressure-on-eu-deal/</a> []
Andrew Gardner, “The EU-Ukraine association agreement: a potted history” Politico, September 17, 2014, <a href=”https://www.politico.eu/article/the-eu-ukraine-association-agreement-a-potted-history/” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.politico.eu/article/the-eu-ukraine-association-agreement-a-potted-history/</a> []
Pjotr Sauer, “Ukraine suspends 11 political parties with links to Russia,” Guardian, March 20, 2022, <a href=”https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/20/ukraine-suspends-11-political-parties-with-links-to-russia” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/20/ukraine-suspends-11-political-parties-with-links-to-russia</a>. []
Daria Mykhaylishyn, “Російський економічний слід в Україні” [Russian economic footprint in Ukraine], Center for Economic Strategies, September 14, 2020, <a href=”https://ces.org.ua/russias-economic-footprint-in-ukraine/” rel=”nofollow”>https://ces.org.ua/russias-economic-footprint-in-ukraine/</a>. []
“Історія економічної незалежності від Росії в 10 інфографіках” [The history of economic independence from Russia in 10 infographics], Center for Economic Strategy, August 24, 2022, https://www.epravda.com.ua/publications/2022/08/24/690755/; Ira Krytska, “Медведчук, Фірташ та росіяни: до нацагентства АРМА передали понад 30 000 активів з початку війни” [Medvedchuk, Firtash and the Russians: more than 30,000 assets have been transferred to the ARMA national agency since the beginning of the war], Forbes, August 24, 2022, <a href=”https://forbes.ua/news/do-natsagentstva-arma-peredali-ponad-30-000-aktiviv-z-pochatku-viyni-24082022-7901″ rel=”nofollow”>https://forbes.ua/news/do-natsagentstva-arma-peredali-ponad-30-000-aktiviv-z-pochatku-viyni-24082022-7901</a>. []
Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine, “Open repeated appeal of the Minister of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine Oleksandr Tkachenko regarding the call to abandon Russian culture and its performers,” October 12, 2022, https://mcip.gov.ua/en/news/an-open-repeated-appeal-of-the-minister-of-culture-and-information-policy-of-ukraine-oleksandr-tkachenko-regarding-the-call-to-boycott-russian-culture-and-its-performers/. []
News Desk, “Russia Increases Arts Funding As Sanctions Take Hold,” Artforum, April 21, 2022, <a href=”https://www.artforum.com/news/russia-increases-arts-funding-as-sanctions-take-hold-88401″ rel=”nofollow”>https://www.artforum.com/news/russia-increases-arts-funding-as-sanctions-take-hold-88401</a>. []
“‘Все мы милитаристы и имперцы. Война — это самоутверждение нации’ Директор Эрмитажа Михаил Пиотровский дал интервью ‘Российской газете.’ Вот самые невероятные цитаты” [“We are all militarists and imperialists. War is the self-assertion of the nation.” Director of the Hermitage Museum, Mikhail Piotrovsky, gave an interview to “Rossiyskaya Gazeta.” Here are the most incredible quotes], Meduza, June 24, 2022, <a href=”https://meduza.io/feature/2022/06/24/vse-my-militaristy-i-impertsy-voyna-eto-samoutverzhdenie-natsii” rel=”nofollow”>https://meduza.io/feature/2022/06/24/vse-my-militaristy-i-impertsy-voyna-eto-samoutverzhdenie-natsii</a>. []
Eleonora Mitrofanova, “‘Русский мир’ без границ” [“Russian world” without borders], Russia in Global Culture, February 2, 2004, <a href=”https://globalaffairs.ru/articles/russkij-mir-bez-granicz/” rel=”nofollow”>https://globalaffairs.ru/articles/russkij-mir-bez-granicz/</a>. []
“Putin: Soviet collapse a ‘genuine tragedy’”, NBC News, April 25, 2005, <a href=”https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna7632057″ rel=”nofollow”>https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna7632057</a> []
Liesl Gerntholtz, “Ukrainian Culture Under Attack: Erasure of Ukrainian Culture in Russia’s War Against Ukraine,” Pen America, December 2, 2022, <a href=”https://pen.org/report/ukrainian-culture-under-attack/” rel=”nofollow”>https://pen.org/report/ukrainian-culture-under-attack/</a>. []
Lev Losev and Jane Ann Miller. Joseph Brodsky: a literary life. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011. []
Kate Tsurkan, “Putin has forced Ukrainians to view Russian culture as a weapon of war,” UkraineAlert, Atlantic Council, August 8, 2022, <a href=”https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/putin-has-forced-ukrainians-to-view-russian-culture-as-a-weapon-of-war/” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/putin-has-forced-ukrainians-to-view-russian-culture-as-a-weapon-of-war/</a>. []
Dasha Litvinova, “What to Know About the Ukraine-War Propaganda Movie in Russian Theaters,” Time, August 28, 2023, <a href=”https://time.com/6308879/witness-movie-russia-ukraine-war-propaganda/” rel=”nofollow”>https://time.com/6308879/witness-movie-russia-ukraine-war-propaganda/</a>. []
“Российский омбудсмен Львова-Белова: с начала войны в Россию вывезли более 700 тысяч украинских детей” [Russian ombudsman of Lviv-Belov: since the beginning of the war, more than 700 thousand Ukrainian children have been taken to Russia], Nastoyasheye Vremia, July 31, 2023, <a href=”https://www.currenttime.tv/a/v-rossiyu-vyvezli-bolee-700-tysyach-ukrainskih-detey/32527102.html” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.currenttime.tv/a/v-rossiyu-vyvezli-bolee-700-tysyach-ukrainskih-detey/32527102.html</a>. []
Kelly McKone, “Reconciliation in Practice,” United States Institute of Peace, August 6, 2015, <a href=”https://www.usip.org/publications/2015/08/reconciliation-practice” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.usip.org/publications/2015/08/reconciliation-practice</a>. []
Vamil D. Volkan, “Large-group identity: ‘Us and them’ polarizations in the international arena,” Psychoanal, Culture & Society 14 (2009): 4–15, <a href=”https://doi.org/10.1057/pcs.2008.50″ rel=”nofollow”>https://doi.org/10.1057/pcs.2008.50</a>. []
Change to: Radio Liberty, “Truth Justice, Reconciliation Commission.” [] []
Elena Davlikanova, “Ukraine Shuns Russia’s Frenzied Victory Cult,” Center for European Policy Analysis, May 1, 2023, <a href=”https://cepa.org/article/ukraine-shuns-russias-frenzied-victory-cult/” rel=”nofollow”>https://cepa.org/article/ukraine-shuns-russias-frenzied-victory-cult/</a>. []
Ernesto Verdeja, Unchopping a Tree: Reconciliation in the Aftermath of Political Violence (Temple University Press, 2009), <a href=”https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt14bt6c8″ rel=”nofollow”>https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt14bt6c8</a>. []
“Ставлення населення України до Росії та населення Росії до України, листопад 2021 року” [Attitude of the Population of Ukraine Towards Russia and the Population of Russia Toward Ukraine, November 2021], Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, December 17, 2021, <a href=”https://www.kiis.com.ua/?lang=ukr&cat=reports&id=1078″ rel=”nofollow”>https://www.kiis.com.ua/?lang=ukr&cat=reports&id=1078</a>. []
Oleksandr Moskalenko, “Who is to Judge Mr. Putin?” Center for European Policy Analysis, July 25, 2023, <a href=”https://cepa.org/comprehensive-reports/who-is-to-judge-mr-putin/” rel=”nofollow”>https://cepa.org/comprehensive-reports/who-is-to-judge-mr-putin/</a>.) Initiatives to ensure justice for the victims of war crimes committed in the occupied territories of Ukraine can foster cooperation between Russian and Ukrainian civil society and elites.
Over the past three decades, the Russian leadership has not adequately addressed historical events like the Holodomor, the deportation of Crimean Tatars, or the repression of Ukrainian dissidents. Attempts to raise these issues are often dismissed by Russian propaganda as Ukrainian nationalism. ((“Как украинские политики восемь лет разжигали ненависть ко всему русскому” [How Ukrainian politicians incited hatred for everything Russian for eight years], RIA News, June 15, 2022, <a href=”https://ria.ru/20220615/nenavist-1795295703.html” rel=”nofollow”>https://ria.ru/20220615/nenavist-1795295703.html</a>. []
Change to: Volkan, “Large Group Identity.” []
“В счастливое будущее одним скачком.” Люстрация 35 лет назад и послезавтра [“One jump to a happy future.” Lustration 35 years ago and the day after tomorrow], Sever.Realii, October 26, 2023, <a href=”https://www.severreal.org/a/v-schastlivoe-buduschee-odnim-bolshim-skachkom-lyustratsiya-35-let-nazad-i-poslezavtra/32653891.html” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.severreal.org/a/v-schastlivoe-buduschee-odnim-bolshim-skachkom-lyustratsiya-35-let-nazad-i-poslezavtra/32653891.html</a>. []
“Ukraine War: ‘Mass burial site containing 440 graves’ found in Izyum,” Sky News, September 15, 2022, YouTube video, 2:37, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MozdNUX1jPQ. []
Enrique Sánchez and Sylvia Rognvik, “Building Just Societies: Reconciliation in Transitional Settings,” Workshop Report Accra, Ghana, June 5-6, 2012, UN Library,April 2016, <a href=”https://doi.org/10.18356/b112c050-en” rel=”nofollow”>https://doi.org/10.18356/b112c050-en</a>. []
“Corruption Perceptions Index,” Transparency International, 2022, <a href=”https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022″ rel=”nofollow”>https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022</a>. []
“Germany’s vice-chancellor backs ‘federalization’ in Ukraine,” Reuters, August 23, 2014, <a href=”https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-germany-gabriel-idUSKBN0GN08X20140823″ rel=”nofollow”>https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-germany-gabriel-idUSKBN0GN08X20140823</a>. []
“В России – 2 миллиона украинцев и ни одной украинской школы – Минобразования в ООН” [There are 2 million Ukrainians in Russia and not a single Ukrainian school – Ministry of Education at the UN], <a href=”http://Zenzor.net” rel=”nofollow”>Zenzor.net</a>, December 2, 2019, <a href=”https://censor.net/ru/news/3162990/v_rossii_2_milliona_ukraintsev_i_ni_odnoyi_ukrainskoyi_shkoly_minobrazovaniya_v_oon” rel=”nofollow”>https://censor.net/ru/news/3162990/v_rossii_2_milliona_ukraintsev_i_ni_odnoyi_ukrainskoyi_shkoly_minobrazovaniya_v_oon</a>. []
Anastasia Mayer, “Минпросвещения разработало учебное пособие по украинскому языку советского образца” [The Ministry of Education has developed a Soviet-style textbook on the Ukrainian language], Vedomosti, April 6, 2023, <a href=”https://www.vedomosti.ru/society/articles/2023/04/06/969703-minprosvescheniya-razrabotalo-uchebnoe-posobie-po-ukrainskomu-yaziku-sovetskogo-obraztsa” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.vedomosti.ru/society/articles/2023/04/06/969703-minprosvescheniya-razrabotalo-uchebnoe-posobie-po-ukrainskomu-yaziku-sovetskogo-obraztsa</a>. []
“У МОН розповіли, скільки школярів в Україні вивчають російську” [The Ministry of Education and Science disclosed the number of schoolchildren in Ukraine who learn Russian], Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, April 25, 2022, <a href=”https://www.radiosvoboda.org/a/news-ukraina-shkola-rosiyska-mova/31820486.html” rel=”nofollow”>https://www.radiosvoboda.org/a/news-ukraina-shkola-rosiyska-mova/31820486.html</a>. []
“Ставлення до статусу російської мови в Україні” [Attitude toward the status of the Russian language in Ukraine], Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, April 10, 2015, https://www.kiis.com.ua/?&cat=reports&id=517&page=1; Olena Barsukova, “Що українці думають про ‘утиски російськомовних’ та державну мову? Опитування” [What do Ukrainians think about the ‘oppression of Russian speakers’ and the state language? Poll], Ukrainska Pravda, June 2, 2022, <a href=”https://life.pravda.com.ua/society/2022/06/2/248924/” rel=”nofollow”>https://life.pravda.com.ua/society/2022/06/2/248924/</a>. []
Elena Davlikanova, “Winston Churchill and Kyiv’s Red Weavers,” Center for European Policy Analysis, August 1, 2023, <a href=”https://cepa.org/article/winston-churchill-and-kyivs-red-weavers/” rel=”nofollow”>https://cepa.org/article/winston-churchill-and-kyivs-red-weavers/</a>. []
Verdeja, Unchopping a Tree. []
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Donald Trump was asked what’s been found out about his assassination attempt and it was like the essence of Trump in 46 seconds flat

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Post date May 19, 2025

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donald trump

You’ll remember back on 13 July last year a shooter took aim at Donald Trump at an open air campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

Thomas Matthew Crooks was subsequently killed by secret service agents, but only after he had killed one person and critically injured two others. And left Trump with a bloody ear.

But so little has been uncovered about the incident or the motivation of 20-year-old Crooks that it’s inevitably led to swirling speculation about what really happened that day. Well, that and Trump’s previously unrecognised ability to heal fast. Very, very fast.

So it was only natural that people want to know what the entire power of the FBI (and everyone else) had managed to find out, 10 months later.

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And the president’s response, such as it was, is like a 46-second distallation of the very essence of Donald Trump.

Hardly proof of a conspiracy, obviously, but answers like that is hardly going to make any of the suspicions go away any time soon, right?

And here’s precisely what people made of whatever the hell that was.

Still, at least the FBI will be able to clear up any doubt, right?

Never mind.

Source @atrupar

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Путин: результатом СВО должен стать долгосрочный мир

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Post date May 18, 2025

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18 мая, 03:23,

обновлено 18 мая, 03:30

Военная операция на Украине

Путин: результатом СВО должен стать долгосрочный мир

Президент заверил, что у России достаточно сил, чтобы завершить СВО с нужным для себя итогом

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Russians and Ukrainians meet in Turkey for first talks in 3 years

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Post date May 16, 2025

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Summary

Negotiators meet at Istanbul palace
Rubio says he doesn’t expect major breakthrough
Trump says he’ll meet Putin as soon as they can arrange it

ISTANBUL, May 16 (Reuters) – Russian and Ukrainian negotiators met in Istanbul on Friday at their first direct peace talks in more than three years, under pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump to end Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War Two.

Live television showed Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan addressing Russian and Ukrainian negotiators at the lavish Dolmabahce Palace on the Bosphorus. Half of the Ukrainian delegation wore camouflage military fatigues, sitting at a table directly facing their Russian counterparts, who were in suits.

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Fidan said it was critical to achieve a ceasefire as soon as possible. He said he was happy to see the will of both sides to open a new window of opportunity for peace, and it was important that the Istanbul talks form the basis for a meeting between leaders of the two countries.

“There are two paths ahead of us: one road will take us on a process that will lead to peace, while the other will lead to more destruction and death. The sides will decide on their own, with their own will, which path they choose,” Fidan said.

The warring sides had not met face-to-face since March 2022, the month after Russia’s invasion.

Expectations for a major breakthrough, already low, were dented further on Thursday when Trump, winding up a Middle East tour, said there would be no movement without a meeting between himself and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin.

The head of Ukraine’s delegation, setting out Kyiv’s priorities, said peace was only possible if Russia agreed to a 30-day ceasefire, the return of abducted Ukrainian children and an exchange of all prisoners of war.

Russia says it wants to end the war by diplomatic means and is ready to discuss a ceasefire. But it has raised a list of questions and concerns, saying Ukraine could use a pause to rest its forces, mobilise extra troops and acquire more western weapons.

Ukraine and its allies accuse Putin of stalling, and say he is not serious about wanting peace.

PUTIN STAYS AWAY

It was Putin who proposed the direct talks in Turkey, but he spurned a challenge from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to meet him there in person, instead sending a team of mid-level officials. Ukraine responded by naming negotiators of similar rank.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Trump’s Ukraine envoy Keith Kellogg were also in Istanbul, where a flurry of separate diplomatic contacts took place earlier on Friday.

Rubio told reporters on Thursday night that, based on the level of the negotiating teams, a major breakthrough was unlikely.

“I hope I’m wrong. I hope I’m 100% wrong. I hope tomorrow the news says they’ve agreed to a ceasefire; they’ve agreed to enter serious negotiations. But I’m just giving you my assessment, honestly,” he said.

Russia said on Friday it had captured another village in its slow, grinding advance in eastern Ukraine. Minutes before the start of the Istanbul meeting, Ukrainian media reported an air alert and explosions in the city of Dnipro.

Russia says it sees the talks as a continuation of the negotiations that took place in the early weeks of the war in 2022, also in Istanbul.

But the terms under discussion then, when Ukraine was still reeling from Russia’s initial invasion, would be deeply disadvantageous to Kyiv. They included a demand by Moscow for large cuts to the size of Ukraine’s military.

Zelenskiy’s chief of staff Andriy Yermak said Russian attempts to align the current talks with the unsuccessful earlier negotiations would fail.

With Russian forces now in control of close to a fifth of Ukraine, Putin has held fast to his longstanding demands for Kyiv to cede territory, abandon its NATO membership ambitions and become a neutral country.

Ukraine rejects these terms as tantamount to capitulation, and is seeking guarantees of its future security from world powers, especially the United States.

MUTUAL HOSTILITY

Ukraine repelled Russia’s initial assault on the capital Kyiv in 2022 and recaptured swathes of land seized by Russians in the war’s first year. But since then Russian forces have slowly but relentlessly advanced for most of the past two years.

Hundreds of thousands of soldiers have been wounded or killed on both sides. Thousands of Ukrainian civilians have been killed, whole cities have been destroyed and millions of Ukrainians have been forced to flee their homes.

Moscow says it was forced to mount its “special military operation” in response to NATO expansion and the prospect that the western alliance would admit Ukraine as a member and use it as a launchpad to attack Russia. Any settlement of the conflict must address these “root causes”, the Kremlin says.

Kyiv and its allies reject that as a false pretext for what they call an imperial-style land grab.

Oleksandr Syrskyi, Ukraine’s army chief, said late on Thursday that Russia has about 640,000 troops in Ukraine at the moment and had “turned its aggression against Ukraine into a war of attrition”. He said there was active combat along the entire frontline, stretching many hundreds of miles.

Reporting by Can Sezer, Humeyra Pamuk, Tom Balmforth and Vladimir Soldatkin in Istanbul, Olena Harmash in Kyiv, Ece Toksabay and Tuvan Gumrukcu in Ankara and Reuters reporters in Moscow; Writing by Mark Trevelyan; Editing by Peter Graff

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