By Fred Weir, Facebook, 11/25/23
From Ivan Katchanovski, of the University of Ottawa, on the peace deal that was all but signed and delivered back in April, 2022. The interview, which I am posting in an English-dubbed version, shows David Arakhamia, head of Zelensky’s parliamentary faction, admitting pretty much what Putin, Gerhard Schröder, Naftali Bennet, and others have claimed: that there was a deal, already initialed, but scuttled after Boris Johnson made a sudden visit to Kyiv. The main Russian demand was Ukrainian neutrality, plus language protections for the Russian-speakers in east Ukraine. A month after the war started, Putin would have settled for that! Well, there it is.
Ivan Katchanovski:
Wow! In his interview, the head of the Zelensky party faction in the Ukrainian parliament & the head of the Ukrainian delegation in the Ukraine-Russia talks confirms that a peace deal could have been reached in spring 2022 if Ukraine agreed to neutrality. He said that Russia was ready to end the war in such case & that Ukrainian neutrality/no NATO membership was the key Russian condition, which also included “denazification,” “Russian language rights,” etc. He also confirmed that Western countries knew everything concerning peace talks and told Zelensky not to sign peace deal and that British PM Johnson during his visit told them to continue fighting. P.S. Subtitles can be automatically translated. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5hrJNGZxYE&t=1s]
Translation of interview by Davyd Arakhamiia, head of Zelensky faction in Ukraine parliament & head of Ukrainian delegation at peace talks with Russia: “They really hoped almost to the last moment that they would force us to sign such an agreement so that we would take neutrality. It was the most important thing for them. They were prepared to end the war if we agreed to, – as Finland once did, – neutrality, and committed that we would not join NATO.
In fact, this was the key point. Everything else was simply rhetoric and political ‘seasoning’ about denazification, the Russian-speaking population and blah-blah-blah…
Moreover, when we returned from Istanbul, Boris Johnson came to Kyiv and said that we would not sign anything with them at all, and let’s just fight.”
Arakhamiia added that Western partners knew about the negotiations and saw drafts of documents, but did not attempt to make a decision for Ukraine, but rather gave advice.
“They actually advised us not to go into ephemeral security guarantees [with the Russians – ed.], which could not have been given at that time at all,” said Arakhamiia, who headed the negotiating delegation.”