TALKS with Russia are beginning to be “constructive”, said a Ukrainian negotiator yesterday, describing what he perceived as an apparent shift in Moscow’s attitude towards Ukrainian resistance and biting international sanctions.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said he noted a change in Russia’s approach as it realised “the real price of war”.

“At the very start of the war, they insisted on total domination. They were not expecting that Ukraine would deliver such severe resistance,” he said in an interview with Canadian daily The Globe and Mail in Lviv.

“They are starting to realise the real price of war now, and we are starting to have constructive negotiations.”

Podolyak participated in the first two rounds of talks between Russia and Ukraine, held on the border of Belarus.

A third session of talks is scheduled for tomorrow, according to the Ukrainian delegation.

The Russians “have lost massive amounts of equipment and manpower. Sanctions like we have never seen before are collapsing their economy. Their country has become an outlaw on the international scene and their propaganda does not work at all”, said Podolyak.

He repeated Zelenskyy’s request for Nato to impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine, which the Western alliance rejected on Friday.

Zelenskyy lashed out at the group, saying the alliance has given “the green light for further bombing of Ukrainian cities and villages.”

While stressing that both sides in the talks have agreed to not discuss details of the negotiations, Podolyak said Ukraine’s objectives remain an immediate ceasefire, security guarantees that it will not be attacked again, and significant compensation for the loss of life and damage to its cities. – AFP, March 6, 2022.