Russia and Ukraine will inevitably have to sit down at the negotiating table to resolve the ongoing conflict, Türkiye’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told a conference on Wednesday. Military action won’t bring about its end and will only prolong the hostilities, he added.
“One way or another, this war will end at the [negotiating] table,” the minister told an audience at Bilkent University in Ankara. “We do not think that it will end through military gains on the ground,” he added, warning of a “risk of war that could last for decades.”
According to Cavusoglu, Russia and Ukraine were already “very close to a ceasefire” during talks in Istanbul in spring before “moving away” from the negotiating table. The two sides haven’t sat down to negotiate since talks in Istanbul in late March. Moscow was initially optimistic about the prospects for a peace deal but later accused Kiev of torpedoing the talks.