ISTANBUL — High-stakes peace talks Thursday between Russia and Ukraine that were called for by Vladimir Putin hit speed bumps as the Kremlin confirmed he would be skipping the negotiations and President Donald Trump added that “nothing” would happen unless he and his Russian counterpart attended.
Uncertainty over the start date, location and whether either side would even participate made for chaotic scenes in the Turkish capital, Ankara, as well as in Antalya and Istanbul — where some 200 journalists and crew were massed outside the Ottoman-era Dolmabahçe Palace with no clear idea of when talks would get underway.
A back and forth between Kyiv, Moscow and the Trump administration hinted at the possibility of a three-way meeting involving Trump, Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. That did not ultimately materialize.
While speaking to reporters on Air Force One en route to the United Arab Emirates, Trump was asked about the level of the delegation Russia sent to Turkey.
“Look, nothing’s going to happen until Putin and I get together, OK?” he said, adding that Putin did not lead the delegation because Trump had chosen not to attend. “He wasn’t going if I wasn’t there.”
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov had earlier told CNN “no,” when asked Thursday whether Putin would be attending talks in Turkey. He added on a later media call that there are “no preparations” for talks between Putin and Trump in the coming days.
Putin made the suggestion for negotiations “without any preconditions” after Ukrainian allies, including Germany, France and Britain presented an ultimatum to Moscow to either accept the ceasefire proposal or face additional sanctions.
The Russian leader’s no-show is expected to further antagonize the White House, which has markedly changed its tone over the war in the past weeks. After his historic Oval Office shouting match with Zelenskyy, Vice President JD Vance has shifted to accusing Moscow of “asking for too much” in the bilateral peace talks senior Trump administration officials have held with Russia in recent weeks.
That is partly because Trump’s major gripe with Ukraine — that American taxpayers have mostly funded its defense — was soothed after the two nations struck a minerals deal that would go some way to repaying American military aid.
Zelenskyy has also presented himself as compliant, backing Trump’s calls for an immediate 30-day ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia.
Trump has said he is “always considering” additional sanctions against Russia if he believes Moscow is blocking the peace process, with officials also suggesting secondary sanctions on the buyers of Russian oil.
After heeding Trump’s calls to accept Putin’s initial suggestion of talks Sunday, Zelenskyy landed Thursday in Ankara.
Before a planned meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Zelenskyy said he would meet with a broader Turkish delegation, as well as American diplomats.
“The level of the Russian delegation is not officially known to me yet, but from what we see — it looks like not a serious level,” Zelenskyy said, using a Ukrainian word meaning “sham” or “theatrical.”
“We must understand the level of the Russian delegation and what mandate they have — whether they are even capable of making any decisions on their own,” he added, “because we all know who actually makes decisions in Russia.”
That was instead of joining the talks initially planned for Istanbul, after the Kremlin indicated late Wednesday that rather than Putin, or even Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, it was instead sending a relatively junior team headed by Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky and Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin.
“This week really may change a lot — but only may,” Zelenskyy said Wednesday in an X post, adding, “I am waiting to see who will come from Russia, and then I will decide which steps Ukraine should take.”
“So far, the signals from them in the media are unconvincing,” he added.
While the Kremlin’s last-minute naming of a junior team will do little to dispel Ukrainian and European allegations that Putin is not taking Trump’s peace-brokering attempts seriously, the Russian delegation that arrived Thursday in Istanbul was “ready for serious work,” the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Maria Zakharova said at a news briefing the same day.
As well as uncertainty over whether Ukraine would even send a delegation to the scaled-down talks in Istanbul, Kyiv and Moscow appeared to disagree over the start time of talks.
While Russian media initially reported a 10 a.m. local time start (3 a.m. ET) at the Dolmabahçe Palace, that shifted to midday and then after 5 p.m.
The confusion looked set to continue in Istanbul late Thursday morning, with American personnel appearing to be preparing a venue for a U.S. delegation to use as a base, with officials huddled in urgent meetings and two security staff arriving with a German shepherd dog.
State-run broadcaster Russia 1 TV, meanwhile, said that 89 Russian journalists have been accredited to cover the negotiations with the station’s reporters suggesting to NBC News that they were told the negotiations would conclude Thursday.
Keir Simmons and Natasha Lebedeva reported from Istanbul, and Mithil Aggarwal from Hong Kong.
