New Delhi: As smoke nonetheless rises from scorched Russian airbases, two delegations make their approach to Istanbul – not with olive branches, however with blueprints and battle scars.
Ukraine’s drone strikes, a long-range assault code-named ‘Spider’s Internet’, have despatched shockwaves by Russia’s strategic air command simply hours earlier than peace negotiators sit down for an necessary second spherical of talks. The timing isn’t any coincidence.
Focusing on Russian aviation strongholds so far as 4,000 kilometers from Ukraine’s borders, Sunday’s drone blitz was hailed by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as a “good consequence” and a historic milestone. Ukraine claims it knocked out over 40 plane, together with bombers and early-warning planes – the plane believed to be central to assaults on Ukrainian cities.
However this was no spur-of-the-moment counterstrike. It was the climax of 18 months of covert planning, drone smuggling and exact execution by Ukraine’s Safety Service.
Zelenskyy known as it Ukraine’s longest-range operation to date and one which “might be in historical past books”.
And now, with the smoke nonetheless settling and the world watching, each Kyiv and Moscow are set to fulfill once more within the halls of diplomacy, not the theater of battle.
What Ukraine Is Bringing to the Desk for Peace Talks
Because the Istanbul negotiations resume right now, the temper is something however hopeful. Ukraine arrives with a detailed peace roadmap, a doc obtained by Reuters that lays out a multi-stage path to a ceasefire and, doubtlessly, to an endgame in Europe’s most devastating battle for the reason that World Struggle-II.
Ukraine goes to supply a 30-day ceasefire to halt hostilities and permit humanitarian actions corresponding to prisoner exchanges, the return of Ukrainian youngsters and a proposal for a direct Zelenskyy-Putin summit – a gathering that has lengthy been theorised however by no means realised.
The proposal additionally goals to develop the scope of diplomacy by involving the United States and European powers and framing the decision not simply as a Ukraine-Russia matter, however a continental turning level with world stakes.
However Kyiv isn’t backing down from its purple traces. It reiterates calls for for no restrictions on Ukraine’s post-war protection capabilities, no recognition of Russian territorial management and full reparations for battle damages
It could additional suggest present front-line positions function a place to begin for territorial talks – a suggestion that might additional complicate already fragile diplomacy.
Russia’s Silence, Medinsky’s Trace
Russia has to date formally responded to the Ukrainian proposal. Requested concerning the drone strikes and whether or not they would influence Monday’s discussions, Russian negotiator Vladimir Medinsky replied, “Watch for tomorrow.”
It alerts something from quiet preparation to explosive retaliation.
The Kremlin’s latest rhetoric has hinted at openness to a second spherical of Istanbul talks, even because it grapples with the embarrassment and potential navy fallout of Ukraine’s drone offensive.
For Moscow, Sunday could go down as a “black day for aviation”, as one pro-Russian navy weblog put it. For Kyiv, it’s one thing nearer to a warning shot – a message that Ukraine’s hand on the desk isn’t weak and that its attain, each militarily and diplomatically, is rising.
Diplomacy in Drones’ Shadow
It’s exhausting to overlook the symbolism. Simply as diplomats put together to trade paper in Istanbul, unmanned drones, smuggled and hidden in vans, have delivered a special form of message throughout Russian skies.
The Istanbul summit isn’t solely about peace phrases, it’s about leverage. And with Operation Spider’s Internet, Kyiv is making the case that battlefield innovation can stability political inequality and that even a besieged nation can dictate phrases when it performs its playing cards proper.
Whether or not the second spherical of talks ends in progress or impasse, the world might be watching. Not only for what is claimed behind closed doorways however for what occurs subsequent within the skies above.