Russia's top negotiator in talks with Ukraine said it was too early to talk about a meeting between the two countries' president.
Vladimir Medinsky, who led the Russian delegation in Tuesday's talks in Istanbul, Turkey, said “there is still a lot of work to do” to finalise a draft agreement before Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy could meet.Speaking on Sunday in remarks carried by the Interfax news agency, Medinsky reaffirmed that the parties reached a tentative agreement on the need for Ukraine to adopt a neutral status and refrain from holding foreign military bases in exchange for international security guarantees.
Asked about Ukrainian negotiator Davyd Arakhamia's claim that Moscow's negotiators had informally agreed to most proposals by Ukraine during the talks in Istanbul this week and the two presidents could discuss the draft deal, Medinsky said he did not share Arakhamia's optimism.
He said the talks will continue online on Monday.
Medinsky emphasised that Russia's stand on Crimea and rebel regions in Ukraine's east remained unchanged.
The Kremlin demands that Ukraine acknowledge Russia's sovereignty over Crimea, which Moscow annexed in 2014, and recognise the independence of Russia-backed separatist regions in Donbas, Ukraine's eastern industrial heartland.