The Duran Podcast - Article 5, federalization and US air support

Episode Date: August 22, 2025

Article 5, federalization and US air support

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the diplomacy that has taken place between the United States and Russia and the United States and the Europeans and Ukraine. And the topic that everyone is focusing on on all sides are security guarantees. So let's talk about security guarantees, something that was brought up in March, April, 2022 in Istanbul. during the first negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, the negotiations that eventually Boris Johnson sabotaged. But security guarantees is something that has been discussed before, something that was almost agreed on, but now it is the major point that all the parties are disputing. So what are your thoughts? Well, indeed. And I think we've now had absolute clarity about the Russian position on this.

Lavarov, the Russian foreign minister, first gave him. a long interview to Russian television about two days ago and then he followed up with comments that he made yesterday in a press conference during the visit to Moscow of the Foreign Minister of Jordan. And I think he made the Russian position crystal clear. And I say this because there's been a lot of misrepresentation of what the Russian position was and it originates from what was supposedly discussed by Trump and Putin in Anchorage. And Wickhoff has given the impression at times that the Russians agreed to the Western powers giving Ukraine Article 5 type security guarantees.

And there were suggestions also supposedly originating with Trump and supposedly originating from a phone call Trump made after the meeting with Putin, that Putin had dropped Russian objections to European troop deployments in Ukraine. In our various programs, we said that this is all a complete misunderstanding, that the Russians absolutely would not drop their objections to European troop deployments in Ukraine, and that the security guarantees that the Russians were thinking about and which they probably discussed with Trump and Whit Gough and Rubio in Anchorage were the same security guarantees that you just mentioned, which was set up, set out in the Istanbul agreement of April 22. And Lavrov has now made that absolutely clear. He went

through in painstaking detail during the press conference with the Jordanian Foreign Minister. whole history of the discussion about security guarantees in the run-up to the abortive Istanbul agreement of April 2022. He suggested, in fact, he said that it was the Ukrainians who first proposed security guarantees to the Russians, that the Russians agreed that there was a negotiation, that the security guarantees were then in court. in the Istanbul agreement, that Russia and China were amongst the guarantor states, and that the security guarantees gave Russia and China, as well as all of the other guarantor countries, the right to veto foreign troop deployments in Ukraine. And he said that this is clearly,

this is the way forward. This is all that we're prepared to countenance. Obviously, we cannot have NATO troops on Ukrainian territory. That is absolutely out of the question. He again brought up the whole question of NATO's expansion and the way in which NATO was expanded, contrary to assurances given to the Russians and how this is the single, most important and biggest root cause of the entire conflict. And he also, by the way, poured cold water on the whole idea that there would be a trilateral summit involving Zelensky, Putin and Trump anytime soon, or a bilateral summit meeting between Putin and Zelensky any time soon. He said that these things, well, the Russians are always open to these ideas.

They're not ruling it out at all, but these things have to be carefully prepared. There have to be long negotiations and discussions before we reach that. outcome. So in effect, Lavrov, who was clearly authorized by Putin and the Kremlin to make all of these points clear, he's poured a shower of cold water on all the speculations and discussions we've had over the last couple of days. And he pointedly reminded everybody that Russia had to agree to any security guarantees being provided to Ukraine. This has to be part of any negotiated solution. It can't be a unilateral matter. And coming back, by the way, to a point that you have made both on your own channel and in our programs. He also discussed the rights

of Russian speakers, of the Orthodox Church, of Russian regions in Ukraine as well, which to my mind made it absolutely crystal clear that as part of a negotiated solution, the Russians are going to press the whole idea of federalization, which you discussed in those previous programs. So, I mean, you know, this is what the Russians have in mind. starkly different to what the Europeans and the Ukrainians were talking about when they met Trump a few days ago and starkly different from what the Europeans have been talking about with each other. Yeah, so Zelensky has come out with some comments.

I believe he has made these comments, but I've been reading on various social media that Zelensky and his administration, they've outright refused the recognition of the Russian language and stuff like that. So, I mean, they're already rejecting the statement from Lavrov and recognizing the Russian language, the Orthodox Church, and all of these things. The security guarantees of 2022, I believe they not only included the countries that were being discussed and were effectively agreed, agreed on. I mean, you know, Ukraine agreed to this. I Like you said, Ukraine actually brought this up. No one wants to mention that in the mainstream media.

But it goes against their narrative. But it was Russia, the United States. They were talking about China. They were talking about India, I believe. I think Turkey was also mentioned. But they also talked about France and the UK on the western side of things. That it would be the United States, France, and the UK, given everything that has happened in this.

conflict, especially the escalation and the rhetoric from France and the UK, which goes on even today, the very aggressive escalatory tone and actions that France and the UK have taken towards Russia in this conflict. Do you think that Russia would still accept security guarantees, even in the format that Lavrov is explaining with France and the UK taking part? Or do you, do you, believe that Russia will only allow the United States. Maybe Turkey would be another, let's say, collective West, let's say more NATO representative, if they were going to allow that, even though they've said no NATO, they've said no NATO in Ukraine. But if they were to allow any countries as guarantors that were from the NATO bloc, you could see the United States and Turkey. But what

about France and the UK? Yeah. I mean, the original idea back in April 2020, was that the security guarantees would be provided by the five permanent members of the Security Council, who are, of course, Russia, China, the United States, Britain and France, plus certain other countries. India, Israel, Turkey, and I believe a few others. I think obviously now we are in a completely different situation. And personally, I don't think the Russians would be at all happy to see Britain and France. France giving security guarantees in any form to Ukraine. If they can be negotiated with the United States, well, why not? So I think you're right. But I ought to say that I think this whole issue,

this whole topic is to a very great extent going to become an academic one. Because I was reading in the British media yesterday that the British would refuse to provide security guarantees to Ukraine if they took the format of the security guarantees that were set out in the Istanbul agreement. So, you know, the British are already basically counting themselves out. And if we go back to what happened in April 2022, what actually happened, and I remember this very, very clearly, I remember reading about it in the British media at the time. When the Western powers learned what the Istanbul agreement was going to look like, Boris Johnson telephoned Zelensky.

There was a telephone call. This was 10 days before his famous visit to Kiev. And over the course of that telephone call, full details of which were provided to the London Times, Boris Johnson said then that if Ukraine went ahead with this agreement, the Western powers would refuse to agree to provide the security guarantees set out in the document. And of course, what Zelensky didn't want was this situation where the only security guarantees would be provided by Russia and China and a few other global South countries and Turkey and Israel.

And that was what basically led to the one of the causes of what led to the collapse of the Istanbul Agreement. So it looks at the British position hasn't changed. They're not prepared to provide security guarantees to Ukraine in any situation where it is like Istanbul Plus. So that's the British position. Whether it will stick is another matter. But I can't imagine that the Russians are at all keen on having the British and the French providing security guarantees or anybody, any of the major European powers, providing security guarantees to Ukraine at this time. Bear in mind that this all needs to be negotiated. And Putin has already made clear that Istanbul is indeed the basis of any future agreement,

but it must be modified to reflect existing realities. And the existing realities are, as we know, that Britain and France have been talking about sending troops to Ukraine. And for the Russians, that is completely unacceptable. troops to Ukraine if they have the U.S. support, the U.S. air support and the U.S. backing. That's the key to all of it because they want to drag the U.S. into a hot war with Russia. That's what it's all about. Why is Russia even bothering with this discussion? Russia's winning.

Russia has won this war. Russia's winning. They're defeating Ukraine. They're defeating NATO. Trump is in a very difficult spot. The only thing that the Trump is, that the Trump is. White House has that their claiming could be used as leverage against Russia is talk about 100% or 500% sanctions on secondary sanctions or tariffs on Russia and India, China.

Now, Lindsey Graham is talking about designating Russia as a terrorist organization based on Melania's letter. So that's Lindsey Graham's new line of attack. But anyway, that's all the United States really has, to be quite honest. I mean, maybe they have other things that we don't know about. But anyway, that's pretty much their leverage at the moment, if you even want to call it leverage. And that bluff has been called by India, it's been called by China. It's been called by Russia.

And it's something that Trump doesn't even want to do, right? So why is Russia playing this game of security guarantees with the Trump White House? Why are they even talking about France and the UK? I can understand Zelensky and Ukraine trying to shoehorn the European Union, the Europeans, the UK and France, into Ukraine, into boots on the ground. I understand why they're talking about Article 5 style, European NATO style of security guarantees because they want Europe in there with the U.S. air support guarantee. So, I mean, you see their ankle. But Russia's could tell the United States, look, U.S., Russia, China, the three great powers, there you have it. Why do you need any other countries?

Why do you even need Turkey? Turkey's been on Ukraine's side from the very beginning, right? I mean, they're supplying weapons to Ukraine all the time. You know, why do you need Turkey? Why do you need any other countries to be quite honest? Well, you don't. You don't say that. And what are they going to do anyway? What would France and the UK actually do?

Well, indeed. I mean, I'm going to make a prediction. I mean, we're not going to get a peace agreement of that kind. We're not going to probably get any kind of peace agreement that's going to take anything like the shape of Istanbul. What we're going to get is going to go far beyond Istanbul because, as you rightly say, Russia is winning the war. And eventually, if there is a peace agreement at all, it will be much, much beyond Istanbul. I mean, I read it. as I said, what Lavrov said, I suspect federalisation is absolutely there, and I think the Russians have been talking about it with each other. And that's, of course, if there's a peace agreement at all, because of course, Zelensky goes on rejecting everything, even lifting bans on the Russian language. By the way, this is a shocking thing. I mean, Lavrov has been mentioning this point, repeatedly, you know, that the way in which the Ukrainians talk about, you know, that they have a right to ban the Russian, the Russian Orthodox Church, that they have a ban to restrict the use of Russian, all of these kind of things. I mean, these are deeply disturbing things, given

the various provisions that there are in the UN documents and indeed the EU and European Council documents about protection of rights and minorities. And the fact that this goes by without anybody raising it in the West or be critical of it, I have to say, I find extremely disturbing. So, I mean, anyway, let's push on. Because the hypocrisy of the West, though. I mean, that everyone knows that this is the hypocrisy of the West. Everybody, everybody knows it. But I think the Russians are indeed going to push this one. And I don't think they're going to let go of it at all. And of course, if the Ukrainians continue to dig their heels in it and refuse to agree to any of this, then sooner or later there will just be a military solution to the conflict

because I don't think the Russians are going to retreat from these positions at all or in any conceivable way. So, you know, to some extent, this discussion we're having about security guarantees is a little academic. I don't think the Russians went to Anchorage. or have interacted with the Americans with any intention to bring up the topic of security guarantees. I don't think that this was something that Putin intended to talk about with Trump when he went to Anchorage. I don't think they wanted to talk about that with Wickoff. Probably they didn't talk about it much with Wake up. The people who are driving this idea about security guarantees and are the Ukrainians and the Europeans.

What has happened is that Trump has publicly said that Ukraine should not join NATO. So what they want to do is that they want to get security guarantees for Ukraine from the United States instead equivalent to NATO guarantees. and they're quite open about this as an ultimate pathway to getting Ukraine into NATO. That it remains, as always, the ultimate objective. So Trump came along to the meeting in Anchorage, and maybe this has been talked about in previous discussions. And he said, look, I'm coming under a lot of heat from the Europeans and the Ukrainians

about security guarantees for Ukraine. And Putin said, look, this isn't a problem. We've already agreed previously in the past in Istanbul that those should be security guarantees for Ukraine. Now, we are prepared to agree to reasonable provisions for security guarantees for Ukraine. He mentioned that, by the way, Putin mentioned that in his press conference, the one he gave in Anchorage. And then out of that discussion, we had this thing spiral, as it often is the

case, especially with the Americans, especially with Wyckoff, trying to make it out that Putin conceded a lot more than he actually conceded. We had this long, complicated talk about security guarantees, Article 5 type security guarantees, what Maloney has been talking about, about European troops in Ukraine, and all of those things. The Americans, as by the way, this isn't unique to the Trump administration. Lots of American administrations have done this before. They have made it look as if the Russians were giving more ground than they actually did. I am sure that this is what happened.

And Lavrov has now been wheeled out to make the position, the Russian position, crystal clear. In my opinion, this is an entirely academic discussion. There cannot be security guarantees without the Russians agreeing to them. And the Russians will not agree to security guarantees in anything like the form that the Americans, the Europeans and the Ukrainians are talking about. I say the Americans, we'll come to the Americans in a moment. And it's debatable whether we're ever going to see security guarantees at all, because Zelensky is proving completely intransigent, as you would expect from him,

on every single issue, which makes, to my mind, a negotiated resolution of this crisis look impossibly remote. So the Russians have reestablished a dialogue with the Americans, which is what they've wanted to do. They believe, and this is something else, by the way, that came out of the interview that Lavrov gave to Russian media. They believe that they've got American commitments to discuss the security architecture in Europe. Here, I think that it's the Russians who are probably misunderstanding some of the things that the Americans said, because I cannot imagine that Trump went into that meeting really intending to reorganize the entire security architecture of Europe.

But anyway, there have been misunderstandings all round, but the Russians have achieved one thing, which was important to them, they've taken the topic of a ceasefire off the table. That has clarified issues. And at the same time, they've not obviously agreed to the American, European and certainly not the Ukrainian ideas about security guarantees. Yeah, I mean, the security guarantees, the reason it's being brought up is because it's the way that they have now to sabotage the peace process. Which is what Putin warned against. In Alaska, he warned Trump. Trump wasn't listening.

But he warned Trump about people trying to sabotage this process. Yes. And that's exactly what we have going on. The minute that Trump stood firm and said no ceasefire, to his credit, he stood firm and said no NATO and no ceasefire, he needed to stay firm on security guarantees. The minute they brought up security guarantees, Trump should have said, we're not going to discuss security guarantees. So just get it out of your thick skulls.

We're not going to talk about it. That's what he should have said. Yeah, exactly. But instead, he stepped in it. And he went on Fox and Friends, and he started to talk about two big oceans that separate Europe and the United States, big, beautiful oceans. I don't even know what he was talking about. Anyway, he went on one of his rants. But in that rant, he said that the Europeans are going to put boots on the ground.

The U.S. is okay with that. And the U.S. will provide some sort of air support, some sort of no-fly zone or something. They would transfer troops over. They would, to Ukraine. they would position their missiles and planes in Poland or Romania or wherever on the borders of Ukraine. Anyway, all of the media ran with this and they all started to put out citations from statements from anonymous officials familiar with the matter, which said that the plan is to do this

and to do that. And Marco Rubio, he's going to be heading up this operation and we're going to see air defense missiles and other missiles in Poland and Romania. and we're going to see the U.S. transferring French and the U.K. troops to Ukraine. They're going to transfer cargo to Ukraine, and then there's going to be all this air support, and that's the plan. It's a four-step process. Anyway, generals are flying into Ukraine. They're flying into Poland, and they're putting all this together, and the Europeans, they've latched on to this, and they're working day and night now to get the troops into position.

The minute a ceasefire agreement is signed, they still use the ceasefire. They still use that term ceasefire. That's why I'm saying it. But that's what the mainstream media is saying. The minute that a ceasefire agreement is signed, then the French and the British troops are in Ukraine with all of the U.S. supported backing to go with it. Trump kicked this off, though, with that Fox and Friends interview, he kicked it off by saying some sort of air support or something like that for the European troops. He did it to himself. He did it himself. And, of course, what makes it even more exasperating is that he does. did it in comments in which he was intended, what he was really intending to do was to reassure

Americans that there would be no boots, American boots on the ground in Ukraine. But again, as he always does, even as he rejects one idea, because there have been some suggestions in Europe, that the United States itself was going to provide those kind of Article 5 type security guarantees to Ukraine and that there would be some kind of American involvement in. even as he was trying to reassure the Americans, the American people, that there are not going to be boots, American boots on the ground in Ukraine. He goes off and he goes off on this ridiculous tangent, which is exactly the one that you said. And of course, at that point, the Europeans, the media, the various deep state operators at the United States, they have a field deck. And they're running off and they're spreading these stories across the media in exactly.

the way that you said until yesterday in the evening we got Elbridge Colby coming from the Pentagon and saying, you know, the only kind of role that the United States is going to play in this whole structure is going to be a minimal one. So you can see this attempt to sort of backtrack on the whole thing. But you're absolutely right. I mean, this is where Trump needs to be a lot more firm and a lot more disciplined than he is. He should have said very, very clearly to the Europeans and to Zelensky when he met them. No ceasefire, no NATO, no US security guarantees, no guarantees from the US to Ukraine. We're not going to get into Article 5 type guarantees or anything like that.

And we are not going to provide any kind of guarantee or backstop to European forces going to Ukraine. That's what we said to the Europeans earlier this year when Stama and Macron came to Washington. And that remains our position. And this has already been clearly set out. And that is the position that we stand by. Now, you'd said that. If you'd made that absolutely clear, we would not be in these. We would not be having this, frankly, ridiculous discussion that we are having now.

If you go to the media in London, by the way, from the opposite side, they are making the same point that we are. They're now complaining about the fact that Trump is vague, that he's evasive, that he's ambiguous, that he doesn't say things that he really means, that this makes it very difficult to understand what he actually does mean. You could see the British, the French, all of those people, complaining about Trump being loose with his words in exactly the same way that the Russians are implicitly complaining that Trump is loose with his words from the other side.

So we've had a whole bizarre discussion about this whole. issue of security guarantees, which, as you absolutely correctly says, should never have happened. My only thinking on this is maybe, maybe there's a small chance that the Trump White House is going to keep everyone busy, including the Europeans with security guarantees, while they go off and work out Istanbul plus June 24 root causes. Maybe. Maybe there's some sort of planning in that direction. But, I mean, I don't know. I think that's. a long shot. But the most likely scenario is that Trump just goes on Fox News like he does all the times, all the time, and he just says stuff that ends up sabotaging his own initiatives,

to be quite honest. The neocons, they're the ones that have really started pushing this security guarantee initiative. Lindsay Graham is now starting to start. to talk about it, how if the Russians don't agree to NATO type of security guarantees, then we have the bone-crushing sanctions, then we have the designations of Russia as a sponsor of state terrorism. I think that's the reason why Trump can't be firm with the Europeans. He can be firm with the Europeans. He doesn't like the Europeans. Everyone saw that in the photos from the White House. He can do to the Europeans whatever he wants. That's obvious. He doesn't have a liking for them. He doesn't have any respect for them. The problem is,

is the neocons are the people behind the Europeans. And that's why Trump, throughout this whole process, has had a hard time being direct and firm because there's this understanding, I believe, with everyone involved, especially on the collective west side of things, that being firm and tough with Zelensky and the neocons is actually being firm and tough with the neocons

and for various reasons, Trump doesn't want to take on the neocons, or at least doesn't want to take on the neocons directly. He wants to go about it in all kinds of weird, weird, indirect ways. So I don't know if you want to comment on that. And then I think we need to talk about to wrap with the video, the other issue, which has to deal with the bilateral talks and then the trilateral talks. You know, you nailed this one when you describe what's going on with these talks. I believe it was Lavrov that actually came out with a statement and said that Russia is more than willing to up the level of officials of participation, where he could be signaling that chief negotiators for Russia could be Putin and whoever Ukraine wants to appoint. That's their problem. But as a chief negotiator, Lavrov was hinting as a chief negotiator, you could be seeing Putin take that role.

which would resolve the issue of recognition of Zelensky if he were to be the chief negotiator for Ukraine. That would resolve that issue of Russia recognition of Zelensky's legitimacy as president. That would resolve that issue if we are looking at an upgrade of the people in the negotiations and that upgrade does include Putin. It also solves the problem of Zelensky as well, actually. in a weird way because Zelensky, if he is the chief negotiator on the Ukraine side, and all of this is in the assumption that this bilateral meeting is going to take place, I don't even know if this is going to take place.

But if Zelensky becomes the negotiator on the Ukraine side, and he has to face off against the chief negotiator on the Russian side, which is Vladimir Putin, Zelensky can also say the part of the Ukraine Constitution, which says that we will not recognize, we will not negotiate with the president of Russia of being Putin, well, we're not negotiating with the president of Russia. We're negotiating with the Russian negotiating team. It just happens to be led by Putin. So in a way, it solves both sides' problems in a weird way, this thinking from Russia.

Anyway, your thought. And then Trump says a trilateral talk after that. And there's all kinds of locations that are being discussed, including Budapest. So your thoughts. Well, first of all, let's talk about Lindsay Graham and the neocons, because you're absolutely right. These are the people that Trump is really at nervous. about. As you correctly said, he doesn't like the Europeans. He has no respect for them. You saw all of that in the optics of the meeting in Washington. They're all kept in a room. They're all lined up against

a wall at one point. There was also a group photograph. And I mean, you saw the look on their faces. I mean, it was absolutely incredible. They all looked somber. And I thought angry, actually. Nobody looked happy to be there. And Trump has no time or patience with these people. The very fact that he interrupted the meeting and went to another room to call Putin, tells you what he really thinks on them. And as you correctly said, and this is a very valid point. It was a very improper thing to do.

And I don't think Putin would have liked it. But the Europeans would have been seething over this. What is, he doesn't take the Europeans seriously, but he does take Lindsay Graham and the coalition that Lindsay Graham has assembled in the Senate, which is supposedly 80 senators. He takes that very seriously. Now, I think that what he does is he throws these people a bone every so often. And I think it's a big mistake because what then happens is they always come back for more. that's the nature of these people. Whereas I think if he took the stance that in fairness to him, Rubio has sometimes done,

which says, look, what are you talking about? These sanctions and these tariffs, you've seen what happened when we've sanctioned India. They go off and talk to China. They don't do what we expect them to do. Do you really want to increase the price of oil? Do you really want to make the life of American consumers, of American families worse? Do you really believe that this is going to change Russia's attitudes? We have already 20,000 sanctions against them, and that hasn't worked.

What makes you think that these sanctions are going to make any difference? And besides, we've done the studies, we've checked with numbers. You're dead wrong when you say that Russia depends. entirely on oil and gas revenues to finance itself. This simply is out of date. It might have been true when Vladimir Putin first became president of Russia in 2000. It is absolutely not true anymore. You know, that's what he ought to do.

He ought to put his foot down, in my opinion, with the neocons, with the Senate. And I'm absolutely sure that if he did that, you'd see a significant number of Republican senators peel away. Probably, probably Graham would still be able to pitch cobble together a bare majority in the Senate because, you know, there's people like him and Tom Corton and Mitch McConnell who would always vote for this. But if it's only a bare majority, Trump doesn't have to worry about it because he can always get Johnson, the Speaker of the House to simply block this initiative and then it's dead. So this is weakness on Trump's part towards the neocons. And here it really does baffle me because when it comes to the neocons, in every battle,

he has fought with the neocons and with their followers in the Senate, Trump has always won. He won. I mean, that's why he's president now. So why he still thinks he needs to appease these people who are unappeasable, I simply do not understand. He gives them a bone just as he's done with security guarantees and Lindsay Graham is running off with it and they're running off with it in the media.

And as you rightly said, they're talking about generals running off to Europe and coordinating the security guarantees and Rubio coordinating the security guarantees. and Rubio coordinating the security guarantees, and you can see that they're trying to box Trump in. So he does this to himself all the time, and instead of strengthening his position and making it possible for him to move forward with what he wants to do,

which his electoral base supports, which is to get the United States out of this conflict, and to start to rebuild some kind of dialogue, with Russia, which is important for the United States to do. All of that becomes far more difficult than it needs to be. But, you know, this is Trump. He's constantly trying to split the difference. He's constantly trying to appease these people.

He has Lindsay Graham as his golfing partner. He allows, he passes on letters from Melania to Putin, which I think was a big mistake again. I mean, Melania wants to talk about children and all of that. But, I mean, to pass a letter like that, which then opens the way for Lindsay Graham to talk about Russia becoming a terror state, designating Russia, a terror state, which in effect makes it impossible to conduct any kind of serious negotiations with the Russians at all.

I mean, this is a huge mistake, but it is one that Trump persistently does, just as he's going on Fox News and talking to Mark Levin of all people and talking about, you know, grandly talking about providing help to the Europeans in the air and they can, they're frying to send troops to Ukraine. That was a mistake too. I don't know why Trump does this, but anyway, he does. And I'm afraid I don't think this is ever going to change. And it's making this whole process far more complicated and far more difficult than it needs to be. Now, as for the trilateral, what we did, if you remember, we had this discussion. I think it was a live stream, in fact, which we had directly after the meeting between Trump

and the Europeans and the Ukrainians on Monday, and just a few short hours after Ushund. Uschikov explained what Putin said. And of course, we did what nobody else does, which is we actually went and studied and discussed what Husikov actually said, which is that Putin did not agree to a trilateral meeting, that he made it, or even a bilateral meeting with Zelensky. He did talk about upgrading the delegations, the existing delegations. the existing delegations meeting in Istanbul, the Russian and Ukrainian delegations, the ones led by Umarov and Medinsky at the moment, he left it open that one that's at some point, Putin and Zelensky could be the chief negotiators, could step in as chief negotiators.

He didn't say this is going to happen tomorrow or the day. after tomorrow or next week. But clearly this is an option. There might be other upgrades. In other words, Lavrov might be taking over as chief negotiator on the Russian side or some more senior figure from the Russian foreign ministry. Who knows? But ultimately, Putin is open to the idea of himself sitting, taking the place as chief negotiator, and Zelensky acting as chief negotiator in exactly the same the way that you said, and for the reasons that you said. And obviously, there's been all this talk about venues, Rome, which the Russians have already killed off, Geneva, which I think is going to be completely unacceptable.

Budapest, which the Hungarians are now advocating. But I don't think the Russians will want Budapest. I noticed that yesterday Putin had another telephone call with Erdogan, and I suspect that Putin clearly envisages that any meeting of this kind will continue to be in Istanbul. And I noticed that in the Russian readout, Putin again discussed the negotiations that Erdogan is hosting between the Russians and the Russians. Ukrainians in Istanbul. I think from a Russian point of view, it makes a great deal of sense to keep the whole negotiation process in Istanbul. Firstly, because it makes it clear that any meeting between

Putin and Zelenskyy is within this format, this already established format. And secondly, of course, It links these negotiations to the negotiations that took place in March and April, also in Istanbul. And the Russians have said repeatedly that the Istanbul negotiations that are taking place today are a resumption of the interrupted negotiations that took place in Istanbul in 2022, which is why Medinsky was reselected as. the chief Russian negotiator. So I think this is probably what the Russians have in mind. Yeah, agreed. All right, we will end the video there. The durand. Dotlogles.com. We are on X. We are on Twitter X, on Rumble, on telegram, and go to the Duran shop, pick up some

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