Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has called on his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to meet in Istanbul on Thursday for talks on ending the war, after Moscow proposed staging direct negotiations for the first time in more than three years.
After initial talks broke down within weeks following Russia's February 2022 invasion, there has been only limited diplomatic contact between the two sides:
- Talks in Turkey and Belarus -
Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, with Kyiv severing diplomatic relations the same day.
Officials from both sides met for several rounds of talks in Belarus and Turkey in the first weeks of the war, searching for a deal to halt the fighting.
In early March, they agreed to open "humanitarian corridors" but blamed each other for failing to evacuate some civilians from the southern Ukrainian city of Mariupol, which was besieged by Russian forces.
At the talks in Istanbul, Russia demanded Ukraine remain a neutral state and be permanently excluded from NATO membership. Kyiv sought an international agreement guaranteeing its security.
Zelensky at the time said his country needed to "recognise" the "truth" that Ukraine would not join NATO. In the three years since, he has refreshed his call for Kyiv to be admitted to the military bloc.
The Russia-Ukraine talks broke down in early April 2022 following Russia's retreat from the Kyiv suburb of Bucha, where dozens of civilians were found killed following a month-long occupation by Russian forces.
Kyiv and the West accused Russia of war crimes -- which rejected the allegations -- and there have been no direct talks on ending the war since.
- Grain deal -
In July 2022, Turkey and the United Nations helped broker the only major agreement yet signed by the warring sides.
The deal between Ukraine and Russia granted safe passage for Ukrainian grain to be exported via the Black Sea.
Russia withdrew in July 2023, saying a separate agreement that aimed to ease sanctions on Russia's own exports of agricultural products and fertiliser was not being implemented.
Ukraine set up an alternative path via a shipping route that hugs the coast of Romania and Bulgaria.
Russia has threatened to target ships and attacked port and grain storage facilities in the southern city of Odesa.
- US mediation -
US President Donald Trump overhauled his country's foreign policy after coming to office in January 2025, seeking rapprochement with Putin.
Washington's negotiators held separate talks with the Ukrainian and Russian sides on March 23 and 24 in Saudi Arabia.
The White House said Kyiv and Moscow agreed to a truce in the Black Sea.
But Russia demanded western countries lift some sanctions targeting its agricultural sector, which the West refused to do, before the agreement would be active.
Moscow and Kyiv also separately agreed with the United States for a 30-day pause on strikes against energy sites but both accused the other of repeatedly breaching the truce.
- Exchanges, repatriations -
The exchange of prisoners of war and the repatriation of bodies of soldiers killed in combat has been one of the few areas of regular cooperation between Moscow and Kyiv.
In the latest exchange, Ukraine and Russia each released 205 captured soldiers. Deals are regularly mediated by the United Arab Emirates.
Russian authorities have also handed over to Kyiv several Ukrainian children who had been taken to Russia or were in Russian-occupied Ukraine, under mediation efforts led by Qatar.
Ukraine is demanding the return of nearly 20,000 children it says were "deported or forcibly displaced" to Russia since 2022.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for President Vladimir Putin over the abduction of Ukrainian children, but Moscow denies the claims.
