Russian and Ukrainian foreign ministers to meet in Turkey on Thursday

The foreign ministers of Ukraine, Russia and Turkey will meet in southern Turkey on Thursday, Ankara announced as the war in Ukraine intensified.

Turkey has sought to mediate between Russia and Ukraine and offered on several occasions to host talks.

“God willing, we will hold this meeting at a trilateral format in Antalya on Thursday” on the sidelines of a diplomatic forum in Turkey, Cavusoglu said Monday in comments published in the official Anadolu news agency.

The announcement of the meeting comes after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held phone talks with his Russian and Ukrainian counterparts.

“Upon President @RTErdogan’s initiatives and our intensive diplomatic efforts, Foreign Ministers Sergei Lavrov of Russia & Dmytro Kuleba of Ukraine have decided to meet with my participation on the margins of @AntalyaDF,” Cavusoglu tweeted.

“Hope this step will lead to peace and stability,” he commented.

Turkey is conducting a delicate balancing act. It is a member of NATO and a traditional ally of Ukraine. But it seeks to maintain good relations with Russia, on which it depends heavily for imports. Ankara has not closed its airspace to Russia and shied away from sanctions on Moscow.

Moscow confirmed on Monday that Lavrov would meet with Kuleba and Cavusoglu.

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told Russia’s TASS news agency that an agreement for the three-way meeting was reached during a telephone conversation between Putin and Erdogan at the weekend.

That would be the first outside gathering attended by Lavrov since the beginning of the war with Ukraine as Russia is increasingly isolated by the Western world.

Ukraine foreign ministry spokesman Oleg Nikolenko told AFP that “the possibility of such a meeting is being considered.”

Israel has been conducting its own efforts to potentially mediate between Russia and Ukraine. Prime Minister Naftali Bennett flew to Moscow on Saturday to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin, and spoke afterward three times with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

There was no immediate indication that any Jerusalem-brokered talks were likely to come to fruition.

Meanwhile, President Isaac Herzog will be visiting Ankara and Istanbul on Wednesday and Thursday, marking the first visit to Turkey by an Israeli leader since 2008. Herzog has no slated plans to visit Antalya and there was no indication he would be involved in the trilateral summit.

The third round of talks between delegations from Russia and Ukraine were slated to begin at 1400 GMT on Monday in Belarus, a Ukrainian negotiator said in a tweet.

“Third round. Start at 1600 Kyiv time. Delegation unchanged,” Mikhailo Podolyak wrote.