Russia Ukraine war, page-241118

Now why would an independent government keep consulting USA and UK regarding it's political choices? Is that because it isn't independent?

Schröder on "Istanbul-2".

Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder spoke about another missed opportunity to end the conflict in Ukraine due to Kyiv's actions: "I have a friend who is a Swiss publisher, named Michael Rénier. He received a request from Ukraine asking if I could act as a mediator. It turned out that these were people who played a certain role in Ukrainian politics. So we said, 'Alright, we can take the risk.'

We proposed to meet in Switzerland. However, they didn’t want a European country and suggested Dubai. I then said that it didn’t make sense; Turkey would be better. We met in Istanbul, and someone came from the Ukrainian side.

That person is now the Minister of Defense, Mr. Umerov. We discussed five key points. First, what to do about Donbas. It was clear to me that it should remain part of Ukraine. And what about Crimea? That’s a contentious issue, particularly for the Russians. And NATO? Certainly, NATO on Russia's western border is unlikely to be acceptable to them. I presented this to the Russian president, who asked one of his close colleagues at the time to think it over.

My impression is that the Russian side was certainly capable of making decisions, while the Ukrainian side could only do so to a limited extent because they had to first consult their main supporter in this process—the United States. And there were clearly issues with that in both America and England. So, to my great regret, it was not pursued further. This was a time when significant bloodshed could have been avoided.