Kyiv March 7 2022: It’s being reported by local news agencies that the Ukraine delegation has arrived in Belarus for the third round of talks – after two previous sittings failed to make any progress toward peace.
It is understood the focus of the talks will once again be humanitarian corridors – to allow Ukrainian civilians to escape from military action as heavy Russian shelling of city centres continues in the south and the east of the country.
As a third round of talks between Russia and Ukraine begins, the Ukrainian negotiator Mykhailo Podolyak urges Russia to halt attacks on civilians.
In a tweet, he says: “In a few minutes, we will start talking to representatives of a country that seriously believes large-scale violence against civilians is an argument. Prove that this is not the case.”
A previous attempt to establish humanitarian corridors on Saturday collapsed when the ceasefire failed to hold.
Overnight on Sunday, a new proposal from Russia was branded “unacceptable” by Ukraine’s deputy prime minister, Iryna Vereshchuk, after it became clear that people fleeing Kyiv would be offered safe passage to Russia’s ally Belarus, while those in Kharkiv will have a corridor leading only to Russia itself.
Of the four cities mentioned, only the smaller ones – Mariupol and Sumy – have evacuation routes that lead to other parts of Ukraine. A spokesman for Ukraine’s President Zelensky called it “a completely immoral story”.
More than 1.7m Ukrainians have so far fled the war-torn country, as the invasion continues into its 12th day.
