Unfinished Peace |
The newest diplomatic push to end the war in Ukraine exposes a paradox at the heart of the current moment: negotiations are speeding up, yet the road to an actual settlement remains strewn with obstacles that neither side appears ready to clear. Five hours of talks in Moscow between Russia’s president and the US president’s special envoy produced polite signals of progress, yet no movement on the core issues that matter.
Both Kyiv and Moscow continue to speak of opportunities for peace, but neither side is prepared to concede the fundamentals that could make any agreement workable. Russia enters these discussions with a mixture of confidence and grievance. Buoyed by incremental gains on the battlefield, the Kremlin has tightened rather than relaxed its terms. Its demand that Ukraine surrender territory it still controls is not merely a bargaining posture ~ it is presented as proof of strategic inevitability. The Russian leadership has also........