(Adnkronos) – Italy will back new sanctions against Russia if its president Vladimir Putin continues to avoid direct negotiations with Ukraine on a ceasefire leading to a just peace settlement, foreign minister Antonio Tajani said Thursday.
“‘On a practical level, I want to be optimistic, but I do not know whether Russia really wants to achieve the goal of peace,” Tajani said on the sidelines of an informal Nato ministerial summit on Antalya, Turkey.
Tajani was speaking after Putin sent aides and deputy minister to peace talks in Istanbul after proposing on Sunday direct negotiations in Istanbul on a ceasefire in the almost 39-month-old war in Ukraine after Russia invaded the country in February 2022.
“If Vladimir Putin wants to continue in the same direction, then new sanctions are needed. And we are in favour of this line,” Tajani added.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, who was due to meet Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara on Thursday, said earlier this week he would not talk to anyone on the Russian side other than Putin.
Zelensky backs in immediate 30-day ceasefire but Putin has said he first wants to start talks where the details of such a truce could be hammered out.
“Moscow probably just wants to continue the war in the coming months, because it is difficult for Putin to change the status-quo,” Tajani said.
“There are a million Russian soldiers, paid more than a Russian worker, and the whole of the country’s industry is engaged in defence,” he said.
“Putin needs time. But that’s his problem. We want peace, but a just peace. We must protect Ukraine, we must respect international law,’ Tajani underlined.
Today’s talks in Istanbul between Russian and Ukrainian delegations are “a first step,” said Tajani.
“But we need a greater commitment on Russia’s part to achieve a ceasefire and then peace. Our task in peacetime will be to safeguard Ukraine, to protect Europe,” he went on.
“We are working hard for peace, but we need concrete actions from the Russian side,” Tajani concluded.
Moscow and Kiev last held face-to-face talks – also in Istanbul – in March 2022, just weeks after Putin launched a full-scale military invasion of Ukraine.
