Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,
On Sunday, German Chancellor Olaf ScholzĀ called for a diplomatic push toward peace in UkraineĀ and said he and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zekensky agreed that Russia should attend a future peace summit.
“I believe that now is the time to discuss how to arrive at peace from this state of war, indeed at a faster pace,” Scholz said. “There will certainly be a further peace conference, and the president and I agree that it must be one with Russia present.”
Scholzās comments mark a rare call for peace in Ukraine from a leader of a NATO country. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has been consistently calling for an end to the fighting, but heās been out of step with other NATO and European leaders.
Back in June, Ukraine organized a conference in Switzerland that was billed as a “peace summit,” but Russia was not invited to attend, so it didnāt make any progress toward a ceasefire.
After the Switzerland conference, Zelensky began saying thatĀ Russia should attend the next summit, which marked a break from his previous position that he wouldnāt hold any talks with Moscow until a complete Russian withdrawal from Ukraine, which was a non-starter.
Russia expressed interest in holding peace talks, but then Ukraine launched its invasion of Russia’s Kursk oblast on August 6. Following the attack, Russian officialsĀ dismissed the idea of peace talksĀ and suggested Zelenskyās earlier comments about inviting Russia to a summit were a bluff.
Last week, Russian President Vladimir PutinĀ signaled that he was softening his position, saying Moscow “never refused” to negotiate.
But thereās still no sign that a peace summit involving Russian and Ukrainian officials is being planned, and the US isnāt expected to support any efforts toward peace, at least before the November election.
Throughout the war, the only time a real peace deal was on the table was back in March and April of 2022. But the US and NATOĀ discouraged Ukraine from signing an agreementĀ and promised to support its fight against Russia.
Tyler Durden
Wed, 09/11/2024 – 03:30