INVESTIGATION: The Diplomacy of Deception: Inside the Kremlin's Machinery for Simulating Peace While Striking

June 23, 2026: Putin "wants peace"

On June 23, 2026, Vladimir Putin declared that Russia was «ready to negotiate» with Ukraine — on the basis of the 2022 Istanbul agreements and the «realities on the ground». The formulation was shrewd, designed for an international audience: who could object to someone declaring themselves ready to talk peace? But behind that diplomatic wording lies a reality that the ISW (Institute for the Study of War) immediately identified and documented: the conditions set by Putin are strictly equivalent to a demand for Ukraine's total capitulation.

That same day, Russian missiles struck Ukrainian cities. The following days brought new massive attacks. Putin's «will for peace» interrupted neither the bombardments, nor the ground offensives, nor the strikes on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure. This is the central paradox of Russian diplomacy since 2022: a rhetoric of peace deployed as a weapon of war, a propaganda tool designed to divide Western allies and wear down global public opinion while the military agenda continues uninterrupted.

A mechanism honed over decades

This is not new. Russia has perfected the art of simulated negotiation in previous conflicts: in Georgia in 2008, in Syria since 2015, in negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program, in the Minsk I and Minsk II talks of 2014-2015 — which Ukraine eventually understood, bitterly, served Moscow solely as time-buying exercises to consolidate military positions. The investigation this text proposes is a systematic deconstruction of that machinery, through the most recent events of June 2026.

This deconstruction is necessary because the diplomacy of deception works: it regularly finds buyers in Western capitals, in exhausted editorial writers, in political leaders tempted by the path of least resistance. Understanding the mechanics of Russian diplomatic lying is the first condition for not falling for it.

I must admit something uncomfortable: this diplomacy of deception works because we want it to work. There is within us — within the West — a deep desire to believe the war can stop, that words can be enough, that a dictator's goodwill can exist. That desire is human. But it is being methodically exploited by the Kremlin. Opening our eyes to that is not cynicism. It is clarity.

What the Istanbul agreements actually proposed

In the spring of 2022, during the first weeks of the war, talks had taken place in Istanbul between Ukrainian and Russian delegations. A draft text had been sketched out. Putin presents these talks as proof of Russian goodwill and as the basis for new negotiations. But what did that draft actually say? It called notably for a «neutral» Ukraine — no military alliances, no significant armed forces, no NATO security guarantees — and implicitly recognized «territorial realities» favorable to Russia.

Those agreements, had Ukraine signed them at the time, would have created a demilitarized Ukrainian state, defenseless, at the mercy of a new Russian aggression whenever Moscow judged the moment right. That is what Putin calls «the basis for negotiation» in 2026, to which he adds the «realities on the ground» — meaning recognition of the occupied territories, including the Donbas, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, and Crimea. The direct translation is: Ukraine surrenders its territorial integrity, its security, and its future in NATO. It is a surrender, dressed up as a peace treaty.

The ISW dissects Putin's and Lavrov's positions

The Institute for the Study of War analyzed on June 23, 2026 the declarations of Putin and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on negotiations. Its conclusion is categorical: their positions «reaffirm the 2022 war aims» — total Ukrainian capitulation. There is no sign of movement toward terms Ukraine could accept with its dignity and security intact. The rhetoric of negotiation is propaganda, not a serious diplomatic offer.

Meduza, the independent Russian publication in exile, reported the same day Putin's declarations about his «willingness to negotiate on the basis of the Istanbul agreements». Meduza's coverage is particularly valuable because it allows us to understand how these messages are constructed for the domestic Russian audience — where projecting the image of a peaceful Putin facing an aggressive Ukraine is required — and for the international audience — where the same rhetoric is used to sow doubt within Ukraine support coalitions.

The 2022 Istanbul agreements have become the mantra of everyone who wants a quick peace without caring about its terms. I want to be clear: a peace built on those terms is not a peace. It is a pause before the next war, with an even weaker Ukraine and a Russia reinvigorated by its victory. Calling that "peace" is a lie that Western leaders cannot afford to swallow.

What do the "Anchorage modalities" mean?

Putin also mentioned the «Anchorage modalities» in his negotiation conditions — a reference to discussions that took place during U.S.-Russia diplomatic encounters in Anchorage, Alaska. This vocabulary, opaque to most outside observers, is deliberately chosen to create an impression of diplomatic sophistication and to suggest that serious discussions have already taken place, from which Russia now wants to draw conclusions.

What analysts following these files point out is that the «Anchorage modalities» do not constitute a binding agreement or even a consensual framework: they are exploratory discussions from which Russia selectively extracts elements that serve it to construct a narrative in which the West supposedly «promised» Russia certain things. It is the classic technique of rewriting the diplomatic past to create artificially legitimized expectations.

The mechanics of historical revisionism in Russian diplomacy

Russia has become a master of diplomatic historical revisionism. Unwritten promises about NATO's non-expansion after 1991 — an assertion contested and uncorroborated by serious diplomatic documents — have become a standard element of the Russian repertoire for justifying aggression in Ukraine. The Istanbul agreements, which were never finalized or signed, are presented as Ukrainian commitments that were subsequently betrayed. The «Anchorage modalities» follow the same logic of retrospective fabrication of a diplomatic framework that never existed.

This technique is effective because it is difficult to refute without diving into tedious technical detail. The claim «we were negotiating in good faith and Ukraine broke off talks» is more easily memorized than a documented demonstration of its falsehood. It is a communication asymmetry that Russia exploits systematically and that the West counters insufficiently.

Russian diplomacy has a relationship with truth that resembles that of a defense attorney professionally tasked with acquitting a guilty client. Every statement is calculated for effect, not accuracy. Every "piece of evidence" is selected, stripped of context, reformulated. Refuting it requires far more cognitive effort than asserting it. That is the liar's advantage over the truth-teller.

What "realities on the ground" means in Putin's vocabulary

The phrase «realities on the ground» is one of the most loaded euphemisms in Russian diplomatic vocabulary. In Putin's mouth, it means: Russia controls certain Ukrainian territories and peace negotiations must begin from that reality. What is omitted from that formulation is that these «realities» were created by an illegal war of aggression, in blatant violation of international law, the United Nations Charter, and agreements signed by Russia itself.

Ratifying the «realities on the ground» in a peace agreement means rewarding aggression and creating a catastrophic precedent: any state can now seize its neighbor's territory by force and, once positions have stabilized, demand that the «reality» be recognized. This precedent would be particularly dangerous in a context where other revisionist powers — notably China regarding Taiwan — are watching closely how the international community treats military faits accomplis.

The four illegally annexed regions: a Ukrainian constitutional impossibility

Ukraine, under its constitution, cannot legally cede territories. This is not a negotiating position: it is a legal reality. Successive Ukrainian presidents, including Zelensky, cannot sign an agreement recognizing the loss of territories without a constitutional amendment requiring a national referendum conducted under free and secure conditions. This constitutional constraint is perfectly well known to Russian diplomats — and it is precisely why the demand to recognize «realities on the ground» is a politically impossible demand, formulated to ensure negotiations fail so that Russia can blame Ukraine.

It is a deliberate mechanism: formulate conditions the adversary structurally cannot accept, in order to be able to say afterward «we wanted to negotiate but they refused». This mechanism has been used in virtually every conflict Russia has waged in the post-Soviet era. Its identification should not be difficult for experienced Western diplomats. And yet it continues to work because media and political pressures in favor of a «chance for peace» outweigh analytical rigor.

Putin's "realities on the ground." There is a concept that sums everything up. If a burglar moves into your house, the "reality on the ground" is that he is there. Do you assert ownership or accept that reality? The question is not rhetorical. It is literally what Putin is asking Ukraine to accept. And some Western leaders seem to find that reasonable. That is frightening.

The 76th exchange: 160 for 160, UAE mediation

On June 26, 2026, a prisoner-of-war exchange took place — the 76th exchange since the war began. 160 Ukrainians were released from Russian captivity in exchange for 160 Russian soldiers, under the mediation of the United Arab Emirates. It is one of the most concrete and humanly meaningful forms of all the diplomacy surrounding this conflict: real men and women going home, reuniting with their families, perhaps beginning to rebuild their lives.

In 2026, 1,596 Ukrainians have been returned from Russian captivity since the start of the year. Since 2022, more than 9,500 prisoners have been exchanged. These figures, reported by the Kyiv Independent and confirmed by Interfax-Ukraine, represent that many lives saved by the only diplomacy that truly works in this conflict: not grand peace rhetoric, but the patient, discreet mechanics of prisoner exchanges, made possible by mediators like the United Arab Emirates who maintain communication channels with both parties.

Prisoner exchanges as a measure of Russia's true disposition

The history of these exchanges is revealing. Where Russia proclaims a desire for peace but sets impossible conditions in diplomatic talks, it agrees — often after lengthy negotiations — to exchange prisoners of war. This acceptance is an indicator of pragmatism within Russian military and security circles, even when political circles maintain a rhetoric of total war.

It also reveals something about Russia's motivations in the exchanges: recovering its own soldiers from captivity is a genuine internal priority — families of soldiers in captivity exert informal but real pressure on the regime. This pragmatism on prisoners, where Russia has a direct interest, contrasts dramatically with its intransigence on political questions, where only Ukraine would have to give ground. It is a perfect illustration of the Russian negotiating logic: concessions where it costs me little, intransigence where it gains me everything.

Every prisoner exchange is a tiny victory of humanity in a dehumanizing war. Real lives, real families, real traumas overcome. I salute the work of the UAE mediators and all those who make these exchanges possible. In the desert of the diplomacy of deception, these exchanges are genuine oases of reality.

Why Abu Dhabi?

The fact that the United Arab Emirates serves as mediator for prisoner exchanges between Russia and Ukraine is revealing of the new global diplomatic configurations. The UAE maintains cordial relations with Moscow — it did not join Western sanctions against Russia — while having close economic and security ties with the United States and Western countries. This balance of positions allows them to act as a communication channel in a conflict where the parties no longer have direct diplomatic contact.

This pragmatic mediation by the UAE illustrates a broader phenomenon: in the multipolar world emerging from the Ukrainian conflict, actors who maintain relationships with both sides have particular diplomatic value. They are not necessarily the West's closest allies or champions of democratic values — it is sometimes precisely their calculated neutrality that makes them possible mediators where others fail.

The limits of mediation in an existential conflict

The ability of the UAE — or any other mediator — to translate successful prisoner exchanges into broader diplomatic progress on political questions is severely limited. Prisoner exchanges work because both sides have a clear, immediate interest in them. Political negotiations fail because the positions of both parties are fundamentally incompatible: Ukraine wants the restoration of its territorial integrity and genuine security guarantees; Russia wants Ukrainian capitulation and the elimination of any prospect of Ukraine's integration into NATO or the EU.

No mediator, however talented and well-intentioned, can bridge that gap if both parties have not decided for themselves that the cost of war outweighs the expected benefit of victory. The role of mediators in this context is to keep lines of communication open for the moment when that calculation changes — not to create the change themselves. This clarity about the limits of mediation is necessary to avoid overestimating what diplomatic conversations can achieve.

I trust the teams negotiating prisoner exchanges. They do essential, difficult work requiring patience, discretion, and courage. What I do not trust are the grand narratives of global mediation — the Chinese peace plan, the African peace plan, Trump's plan — which miss the fundamental reality: Putin does not want peace. He wants victory. And victory on his terms is unacceptable for Ukraine and the West.

How the Kremlin uses peace rhetoric internally

Putin's peace rhetoric serves two distinct functions depending on the audience. For the international public, it aims to divide the coalition supporting Ukraine by suggesting that a peace opportunity exists that Ukraine and its backers are refusing. For the domestic Russian audience, it positions Putin as a reasonable leader facing a «Nazi» Ukraine supported by warmongering Westerners. In both cases, the objective is rhetorical and political — not diplomatic.

This dual function is visible in the timing of Russian peace declarations: they arise systematically at moments when Russia is suffering military setbacks or facing increased international diplomatic pressure, or when debates in Western capitals over the continuity of Ukraine support are intensifying. They are countermeasures in the information war, not sincere diplomatic openings.

The Minsk armistice as a manually applicable precedent

The Minsk I and II agreements of 2014-2015 are the clearest and most documented example of the Russian simulation of diplomacy. They brought an active phase of fighting to an end by providing for a ceasefire, withdrawal of heavy weapons, prisoner exchanges, and a political process. They were never fully implemented by Russia. Ceasefire violations began almost immediately. The political process was deliberately blocked.

What former German Chancellor Angela Merkel said in her memoirs — that the Minsk agreements served primarily to give Ukraine time to prepare — suggests that some Western leaders knew these agreements would not be honored by Russia. If true, it is an implicit acknowledgment of the diplomacy of deception: agreements signed not to be implemented but to create a temporarily more favorable environment for Ukraine. In that case, both sides were simulating.

Minsk was a consensual diplomatic fiction, where each party used the agreements for its own ends without believing in their real implementation. That is not good diplomacy. It is short-term crisis management that bought time but did not resolve the fundamental problem. Today, in 2026, we have a total war. The lesson of Minsk should haunt anyone proposing a quick ceasefire as a magic solution.

Zelensky's position on negotiations

Volodymyr Zelensky has maintained a consistent position on negotiations: Ukraine is ready to negotiate, but only on the basis of international law, respect for its territorial integrity, and credible security guarantees. This position is not irrational intransigence: it is the only coherent position for a leader representing a country that is the victim of aggression and who legally cannot cede territory.

Zelensky also developed Ukraine's ten-point peace formula, presented in November 2022, covering the restoration of territorial integrity, nuclear safety, freedom of navigation, food security, withdrawal of Russian forces, justice for war crimes, environmental protection, escalation prevention, and prisoner security. It is a serious document, grounded in international law, that Russia has never engaged with seriously in any diplomatic forum.

The Turkish mediation attempt: between self-interest and international service

Turkey has attempted on several occasions to play a mediating role in the conflict, including by hosting meetings between delegations and serving as an intermediary for partial agreements such as the Black Sea grain corridor. These efforts produced mixed results: the grain corridor, which enabled Ukrainian exports for several months, was ultimately torpedoed by Russia when it judged that the benefits no longer outweighed the political inconveniences.

This experience illustrates the limits of all mediation in this conflict: when Russia decides an agreement serves its momentary interests, it partially respects it. When its interests change, it abandons it without guilt or explanation. A mediator, however influential, cannot substitute for the willingness to honor commitments on the part of one party. And until proven otherwise, that willingness is absent on the Russian side.

The Black Sea grain corridor. It allowed the export of millions of tons of Ukrainian grain to countries that needed it. It temporarily reduced famine risks. Russia torpedoed it because its short-term political advantages no longer outweighed the benefits. That is the portrait of Russian diplomacy: instrumental, calculated, loyal to nothing it signs.

Trump and the impatience of the "grand transaction"

The Trump administration has displayed from the start an impatience to «resolve» the war in Ukraine quickly. The rhetoric of the «grand transaction» — finding a deal that ends the fighting, even at the cost of Ukrainian territorial concessions — is present in Trumpist circles. This approach treats the conflict as a commercial transaction where each party gives something up to reach an agreement, without dwelling on the legitimacy or justice of the terms.

This approach is dangerous for several reasons. It ignores the legal reality that Ukraine cannot cede territory. It underestimates Russia's ability to use a ceasefire as a pause to regroup and prepare the next offensive. And it sends a very dangerous message to other revisionist powers like China: the West is prepared to reward aggression if it is persistent enough. That precedent would be potentially catastrophic for global stability.

The resistance of European allies to a hasty peace

The NATO European allies — particularly the eastern flank countries with the most to lose from a bad peace — are actively resisting any temptation of a rushed peace on Russian terms. Poland, the Baltic states, Finland, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany have all, to varying degrees, maintained clear positions on the necessity of a peace that respects international law and guarantees Ukraine's security.

This European resistance is one of the most important factors in the coherence of the Western response. If European allies maintain their unity on the necessity of a just and lasting peace — and they have demonstrated the capacity to do so despite the pressures — then Trumpian temptations for a quick transaction will be counterbalanced by the collective weight of European allies.

Trump as peace mediator in Ukraine. The idea would be appealing if it weren't so risky. Trump thinks in transactions, optics, quick media wins. Peace in Ukraine is not measured in magazine covers but in security guarantees that hold for several decades. These two logics are incompatible. And it is Ukraine that would pay the price of that incompatibility.

The Chinese peace plan: goodwill or calculation?

China has presented its own twelve-point «peace plan» for the Ukrainian conflict. This document, received with cautious enthusiasm in some capitals, calls for a ceasefire, negotiations, and respect for state sovereignty — but avoids any mention of Russian withdrawal from Ukrainian territories or any responsibility for the aggression. It is a document designed to give China the appearance of a responsible peacemaker without costing its Russian partner anything.

Beijing's professed neutrality in this conflict is a carefully maintained fiction. China has been Russia's top trading partner since 2022 and supplies it with dual-use goods that have military applications. It has supported Russia diplomatically, including at the UN Security Council. Its «peace plan» is therefore less a serious diplomatic initiative than a communication tool enabling Beijing to present itself as a constructive actor without taking any position that would hurt its economic interests with Moscow.

The Kremlin exploits the "Global South" to legitimize its fake diplomacy

Beyond China, Russia has instrumentalized several countries of the «Global South» — notably South Africa, Brazil, India at certain moments — to give the appearance of international legitimacy to its diplomatic initiatives. Mediation proposals coming from non-aligned countries receive a media welcome that Russia would never have obtained had it presented the same proposals directly.

These countries have their own interests in this conflict — access to Russian oil at reduced prices, arms markets, geopolitical balance between the great powers — and their mediation offers reflect those interests as much as any sincere desire for peace. Russia skillfully exploits this situation to lend international legitimacy to its diplomatic demands that they do not deserve on the merits.

The Chinese peace plan is the most carefully ambiguous document in contemporary diplomacy. Every sentence can be read in favor of Ukraine or Russia depending on the interpretation chosen. That is precisely the point. Beijing wants to appear to be seeking peace without taking risks or positions. It is boutique diplomacy, not principled diplomacy.

The conditions for a serious negotiation

A genuine peace diplomacy between Russia and Ukraine requires several conditions that are not in place today. First, Russia must abandon its disguised capitulation demands and agree to negotiate on the basis of international law. Next, the costs of war for Russia must reach a high enough level that its leaders consider a negotiated peace preferable to continuing the conflict. Finally, credible security guarantees must be available for Ukraine — guarantees that would make any future Russian aggression sufficiently costly to deter it.

None of these conditions exist in June 2026. Russian demands remain maximalist. The cost of the war for Russia is rising but has not yet reached a decisive threshold. And security guarantees for Ukraine depend on resolutions about NATO membership that do not yet enjoy consensus within the Alliance. In this context, Russia's simulation of diplomacy is comfortable: it costs little and gains much.

The role of international justice in any future peace

A lasting peace cannot afford to bypass justice for war crimes committed since 2022. Proceedings before the International Criminal Court, accountability mechanisms for documented crimes, an official recognition of responsibilities — all of this is indispensable for any peace to be durable rather than a simple pause before the next aggression. Russia is obviously opposed to it. But a peace without justice would not be a peace: it would be capitulation dressed up as reconciliation.

Ukraine has meticulously documented Russian war crimes from the first day of the invasion. Thousands of cases have been transmitted to ICC prosecutors. This documentation work is an investment in future justice, even if immediate prosecutions remain limited by political realities. The machinery of international justice is slow, but it is real. And the diplomacy of deception cannot substitute an amnesty for it.

Justice before peace — or justice as a condition of peace. I know that sounds unrealistic when you can hear the bombs falling. But without accountability, a peace with Russia is not worth the paper it's written on. Putin has been indicted by the ICC. That is a start. It is not yet justice. But it is the direction any peace agreement must point in order to be legitimate.

The markers of a sincere offer vs. a propaganda offer

After this investigation, it is useful to establish criteria for distinguishing a genuine peace offer from a diplomatic simulation for propaganda purposes. A genuine peace offer proposes specific, measurable, and verifiable terms; it does not condition acceptance on demands that the other party structurally cannot accept; it is accompanied by a reduction in hostilities rather than a continuation of fighting; it accepts an independent international verification mechanism.

Russian offers in 2026 meet none of these criteria. They are vague where terms should be precise. They set impossible conditions. They are made while bombardments continue. And they systematically reject any international verification mechanism. It is the perfect portrait of the diplomacy of deception, recognizable by these markers as clearly as a forgery by its clumsy brushstrokes.

What the West must do with this analysis

The practical stakes of this investigation are simple: the West must resist the temptation to treat Russian peace declarations as serious diplomatic offers requiring a conciliatory response. Responding to a simulation of diplomacy with a real concession is to be played for a fool. The right response to current Russian offers is to maintain support for Ukraine, increase economic pressure on Russia, and be explicit about the conditions for a genuine peace that the West would be prepared to support.

This explicitness is important: the West must not appear to be against peace. It must appear to be for peace — the real kind, grounded in international law, security guarantees, and justice. This framing is both morally right and politically useful in countering the Russian narrative that it is Ukraine and the West who are refusing peace.

If Putin truly wanted peace, he would simply withdraw his troops from Ukraine. That would be the simplest and most incontestable proof of his goodwill. He has not done it. That is all there is to know about his "peace offers." The rest is diplomatic music for lulling the naive.

The discreet channels between Kyiv and Moscow

Behind the fake diplomacy the Kremlin performs for the cameras, discreet communication channels exist between the two belligerents — used primarily for prisoner exchanges, coordination on certain humanitarian corridors, and crisis management for situations like the nuclear risk at Zaporizhzhia. These channels are real and functional, even during the most bellicose rhetorical periods. They serve as a reminder that states at war always maintain some minimum of practical communication, independent of public declarations.

The question is whether these channels could one day serve a genuine peace negotiation, or whether they remain confined to their limited operational use. The answer depends largely on how the military situation on the ground evolves. Moscow will only negotiate seriously under sufficient military and economic pressure to make continuing the war more costly than peace. Kyiv will only negotiate on the basis of credible security guarantees that make a new Russian aggression in ten years impossible. Neither of these conditions is met in June 2026, which explains why the discreet channels are not producing substantive results.

The discreet role of certain Arab and Central Asian countries

Beyond the United Arab Emirates and Turkey, several countries have attempted to play a mediation or facilitation role. Qatar has been involved in prisoner exchanges. Saudi Arabia has hosted indirect talks. Certain Central Asian countries — notably Kazakhstan — have maintained open channels with both parties while resisting Russian pressure to participate in the war. These actors are motivated by their own interests — regional security, oil market stability, maintaining good relations with both the West and Russia — but their contribution to eventual peace should not be underestimated.

This network of parallel mediations is characteristic of modern conflicts where great powers are not talking directly. It has its advantages — the multiplicity of channels increases the chances that a message gets through — and its disadvantages — the fragmentation can create contradictions and misunderstandings. For these channels to produce results, they must eventually converge toward a unified process with a principal mediator recognized by both parties. This unification of the mediation process is not yet in sight for the Ukrainian conflict.

Behind-the-scenes diplomacy fascinates journalists and analysts because it suggests solutions exist if only the right intermediaries found the right words. I would like to believe it. But the history of Russo-Ukrainian diplomacy since 2014 teaches a cruel lesson: Russia uses negotiations to buy time, not to make peace. Every diplomatic pause has been exploited to rearm, reorganize, and prepare the next offensive. Peace will not come from words. It will come from the field.

The Ukrainian peace formula: ten points that are non-negotiable

President Zelensky has articulated a ten-point peace formula that defines what Ukraine considers the minimum conditions for a lasting peace. These points include nuclear safety (return of Zaporizhzhia), food security, release of prisoners and deportees, Russian withdrawal from all internationally recognized Ukrainian territories, a special tribunal for war crimes, reparations funded by frozen Russian assets, and binding security guarantees for the future. This formula is Ukraine's official reference framework for any negotiation.

Russia categorically rejects most of these points — particularly the full withdrawal from occupied territories, the war crimes tribunal, and reparations. The United States under the Trump administration has at times seemed to want to push Ukraine toward territorial concessions to accelerate peace. This tension between the Ukrainian formula and American pressure is one of the most important fault lines in the coalition supporting Ukraine. Zelensky must navigate between maintaining his principles and not alienating his principal source of funding and weapons supply.

Security guarantees: the fundamental issue that diplomacy avoids

The question of security guarantees for Ukraine is probably the most difficult issue in any future negotiation. The Budapest Memorandum of 1994 — by which Ukraine surrendered its Soviet nuclear arsenal in exchange for security guarantees from Russia, the United States, and the United Kingdom — was blatantly violated. No reasonable Ukrainian government will again accept a peace agreement not backed by binding and enforceable security guarantees — not diplomatic assurances, but concrete military commitments.

The only security guarantee that carries credibility in Ukraine's eyes is NATO membership. Any intermediate solution — American, European, or multilateral bilateral guarantees without NATO — will be viewed as insufficient by Kyiv, after the Budapest Memorandum experience. Zelensky says so clearly and without ambiguity. The question of NATO membership — either before the war ends for territories under Ukrainian control, or with a credible timeline — therefore sits at the heart of any viable peace roadmap. And that is precisely the point where some NATO members still hesitate.

Zelensky's red lines are often presented in the Western media as obstacles to peace — as if it were Ukraine that was being intransigent rather than Russia that is invading and occupying. This inversion of responsibility enrages me. Ukraine is defending its internationally recognized sovereign territory. Its security demands are exactly what any reasonable democracy would formulate after suffering aggression on this scale. Calling that intransigence is mislabeling — it is dignity.

The fundamental equation: costs vs. benefits for the Kremlin

The diplomacy of deception will continue until the cost of war outweighs for Putin — or for his potential successors — the expected benefit of victory. Until that point, Russian peace declarations will remain propaganda instruments, not diplomatic openings. The West cannot force Putin to negotiate sincerely through words. It can only make continuing the war sufficiently costly for the calculation to change.

This cold reality is the compass for correct Western policy: support Ukraine militarily and economically, maintain the sanctions, increase NATO defense spending, and refuse to be lulled by Russian peace offers whose sole function is to delay and divide. It is a demanding strategy of patience. It is the only one with any chance of producing real peace.

The 76 exchanges: the real diplomacy that saves lives

While the Kremlin's grand peace speeches produce nothing concrete, the 76 prisoner exchanges since the war began have brought more than 9,500 Ukrainians home. That figure, quiet and humble, says more about the state of diplomacy in this conflict than all the Kremlin's communiqués combined. Real diplomacy is measured in lives saved, not declarations. On that indicator, the discreet negotiators of prisoner exchanges are worth a thousand times the spokespersons for Russian diplomatic deception.

By Maxime Marquette, columnist

Editorial stance

I am not a journalist but a columnist and analyst. My expertise lies in observing and analysing the geopolitical, economic and strategic dynamics that shape our world. My work is to take political strategies apart, to understand global economic movements, to put the decisions of international actors in context and to offer analytical perspectives on the changes that are redefining our societies.

I do not claim the cold objectivity of traditional journalism, which stops at reporting facts. I claim analytical clarity, rigorous interpretation and a deep understanding of the complex issues that concern us all. My role is to give meaning to the facts, to place them in their historical and strategic context, and to offer a critical reading of events.

Method and sources

This text keeps the basic distinction between verified facts and interpretive analysis. The rule never changes: a factual claim is published only when a verifiable source supports it, and the sources this article actually used are listed under Sources, never here.

Primary source families used by the publication, when the story has them: official statements from governments and international institutions, public statements by political leaders, reports from intergovernmental organisations, dispatches from recognised international news agencies.

Secondary source families: specialised publications, internationally recognised news media, analyses from established research institutions, reports from industry organisations.

When an article cites statistical, economic or geopolitical data, it comes from the institutions that produce it (intergovernmental organisations, central banks, national statistics offices), and the exact institution is named under Sources.

Nature of the analysis

The analyses, interpretations and perspectives in the analytical sections of this article are a critical, contextual synthesis based on the information available, the trends observed and the expert comments cited in the sources consulted.

My role is to interpret these facts, to set them in the context of today's geopolitical and economic dynamics, and to give them a coherent meaning within the larger story of the changes shaping our time. These analyses reflect expertise built through continuous observation of international affairs and an understanding of the strategic mechanisms that drive global actors.

This article describes a documented state of affairs on its publication date, not a prediction: later developments may shift its outlook. No update is promised in advance; when an article is corrected or completed, the change is dated in the text.

I must name one important limit of this investigation: I do not have access to Ukrainian or Russian negotiators, nor to the UAE or Turkish mediators. Everything I know about diplomatic back-channels comes from media sources and analyst reports. It is likely that important elements remain secret. What I can analyze is the structure of public positions and observable dynamics — not deep intentions. On intentions, I may be wrong.