On Saturday, Russia announced its readiness to resume negotiations with Ukraine, while stating that military operations would continue during the talks. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky expressed his willingness to meet his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin during the upcoming G20 Summit in Miami this December.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, speaking on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit in New Delhi, stated that Moscow does not lack goodwill and is prepared to return to the negotiation table with Ukraine.
According to the TASS news agency, Lavrov said, "We remain open to negotiations, but military operations will not be suspended during the talks." This ties Moscow’s readiness to resume political dialogue to its refusal to halt military actions as a condition or parallel measure to discussions.
In a message to Zelensky, Lavrov reiterated Moscow's offer for a direct meeting between Putin and Zelensky, saying, "If he wants to meet, let him come," framing the Russian president's openness to hosting the Ukrainian president in Moscow as a significant gesture of goodwill.
Zelensky had previously rejected a similar proposal for a summit with Putin in Moscow.
Contrastingly, the Ukrainian president subtly suggested an alternative venue, declaring his readiness to face Putin directly if both presidents attend the G20 Summit in Miami.
Responding to a "Deutsche Welle" query about attending the summit if invitations were extended to both him and Putin, Zelensky affirmed, "Yes, of course. We must attend. We must meet, speak, and make decisions."
Zelensky emphasized that the importance of any meeting lies not in exchanging positions or statements but in the results achieved.
He stated, "It's not about words. What I will say to him or what he wants to say to me doesn’t matter. What matters is the outcome."
This indicates that both parties are not closing the door on a potential first direct encounter between the presidents, though disagreements persist regarding the meeting's location and the surrounding political and military conditions.
Meanwhile, Washington is actively trying to reignite the negotiation path to end the Russian-Ukrainian war, now in its fifth year.
US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner visited Moscow and Kyiv last weekend as part of Washington's efforts to restart talks.
Zelensky described the envoys' movements between the capitals as "a good signal," considering their visits to both Kyiv and Moscow as "a sign of respect for our people."
This came after a phone call between Putin and US President Donald Trump discussing war developments, which lasted about an hour, with the Kremlin calling it "very frank" and productive.
The recent developments put the possibility of a direct meeting between Putin and Zelensky back under consideration, but a significant obstacle remains: Moscow wants the meeting on its soil and refuses to halt fighting during negotiations, while Zelensky shows readiness for a meeting with Putin on the sidelines of an international summit in the US.