Russia Doesn’t Want Europe at the Table During Abu Dhabi Peace Talks Between Russia, Ukraine and U.S.
European officials may be in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates during peace talks between Russia, Ukraine and the U.S., but they will not take part directly, Yuri Ushakov, foreign policy adviser to Russian leader Vladimir Putin, said Friday.
His remarks came in response to a Friday Financial Times report in which four anonymous European diplomats said Washington and Kyiv see Germany, France and the United Kingdom as the group that is “most likely to play a role” in three-way peace talks on Ukraine in the UAE.
Ushakov told Kommersant, a privately owned Russian newspaper, that if European representatives “buy plane tickets” to Abu Dhabi and “hang around there somewhere,” that does not yet mean they will take part in the talks.
The adviser to the Russian leader repeated his earlier position on possible European participation in the upcoming negotiations, which are meant to help end Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, now in its nearly fifth year.
Ushakov said Wednesday that European participation in the talks in the UAE was not discussed during Putin’s Tuesday phone call with Finnish President Alexander Stubb and Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre.
The most recent round of three-way Russia-Ukraine-U.S. talks took place in February of this year, a few weeks before the start of the U.S. and Israeli war with Iran.
On Oct. 21, Putin agreed to resume peace negotiations with Kyiv with Washington’s involvement. The move followed intensified diplomatic efforts by the White House and earlier meetings between U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, as well as the leaders of Norway and Finland in Oslo, and then with Putin in St. Petersburg.
There is no firm date yet for a meeting in the UAE. Speaking during a Wednesday visit to The Hague, Zelenskyy said Ukraine “is counting on” talks taking place on Nov. 10. He also said he hoped that after the U.S. midterm elections, scheduled for Nov. 3, Washington “will be ready with all the answers.”
“So it is clear that after Nov. 4 we will have a date,” Zelenskyy added. (PAP)
