Two eventful weeks leave confident Russia

It is 2:30 in the morning.

Inside the Kremlin walls, I walk alone through the vast land trying – and failing – to find my way.

I spot a checkpoint, the approach and show my passport.

“Nyet Vykhoda!” [“No exit!”] answers the guard. He points to the opposite direction.

I come back and, finally, I come to another checkpoint.

“Not far away!” said the sentry.

I’m lost. Inside the Kremlin. In night death.

It’s like being in a novel by John Le Carré.

It was an evening. I arrived at 5 p.m. With a small group of journalists, I was invited to “an event with President Putin”. What kind of event? To start, the Kremlin would not say. Finally, we were told that Vladimir Putin would take up questions.

Eight hours later, the president entered the Malachite hall of the Grand Kremlin Palace and sat at an office.

But there had been a change of plan. No press conference. No questions. Instead, live on Russian television, Putin pronounced a statement in which he offered direct talks between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul.

Finished event, I leave the Kremlin Palace but I take a bad turn. Finally, I locate the correct outing and, in the lingueful eyes, I put a taxi at home.

It was the beginning of what turned out to be a real roller coaster of fifteen. This started with a declaration from the Kremlin night continued with peace talks in Türkiye, then a two -hour telephone call between Putin and Donald Trump.

But, in the end, are we closer to peace in Ukraine?

It doesn’t want to.

Although there are discussions on more conferences and a future “memorandum” possible on “possible future peace”, all of this seems rather vague.

For the moment, the fights continue.

Russia always refuses to register for an unconditional complete ceasefire. He does not intend to return one of the Ukrainian lands that she has seized, occupied and claims to have annexed. On the contrary: he pressure for more.

Currently, the peace process of Ukraine resembles the loss of Kremlin late at night.

It is difficult to see the exit.

And yet the last two weeks have revealed a lot.

First, how Russia neutralizes potential threats and pressure points.

Kremlin critics would put this in another way: how Russia plays for time.

On May 10 (a few hours before I got lost in the Kremlin), after a telephone call with Donald Trump, European leaders had published an ultimatum to President Putin: accepting a long-term unconditional ceasefire in Ukraine in two days or cope with new sanctions.

Since March, the Trump administration has asked Russia and Ukraine to accept a full 30-day ceasefire. Kyiv accepted. Moscow did not do it.

The chief of the Kremlin bypassing the European Ultimatum with his counter-proposition of direct talks in Türkiye. The idea was greeted by skepticism in Ukraine and across Europe. But that was enough to appease Trump and convince him that Russia was serious to want peace. It was everything for talks. The new “overwhelming” sanctions have been delayed.

Before the Istanbul meeting on May 16, President Trump gave the impression that Vladimir Putin could attend. The chief of the Kremlin did not make, sending instead a relatively low level delegation which once again rejected the idea of ​​a long-term ceasefire. But again, the modest results of the talks were sufficient to persuade the American president that progress was underway.

Then came Trump-Putin’s phone call on May 19.

At the end of this one, Russia had still not accepted an immediate cessation of hostilities. Instead, according to President Trump, “Russia and Ukraine will immediately start negotiations to a cease-fire and, more importantly, the end of the war”.

But Moscow already casts a doubt that he would sign a future peace treaty with the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky. For the past year, the Russian authorities have been trying to delegitimize the president of Ukraine since the expiration of his presidential mandate. However, the Constitution of Ukraine prohibits the holding of elections in wartime.

And the reason for martial law in Ukraine is the invasion of Russia.

“Would Russia sit down and sign a peace agreement with President Zelensky?” I asked the Russian Minister for Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov on Friday.

“You put the cart in front of the horse,” replied Mr. Lavrov. “First, we must have an agreement. When it is agreed, then we will decide. But, as President Putin said on several occasions, President Zelensky has no legitimacy … The best option would probably be new elections …”

The Russian media concluded that after two weeks of diplomacy, Moscow strengthened his hand.

“Russia won the last world poker round,” said the newspaper Izvestia last week.

“Donald Trump’s position could not be more advantageous for Moscow,” wrote Kommersant. “Indeed, he supported the position of Russia of” talks first, the ceasefire later “and refused to strengthen sanctions against Russia.”

A social science specialist told Kommersant: “Donald Trump, at least for the moment, is our ideological partner on certain questions. His opinions are much closer to Russia than that of Europe.”

And the ultra pro-Kremlin Komsomolskaya Pravda had this message for European leaders:

“You have been warned. Do not greet threats and ultimatums in front of the bear. Do not try to impose conditions in talks that have nothing to do with you.

“Sit in the hall and breathe the smell of the new world order.”

Moscow’s confidence is also fueled by the conviction that, in Ukraine, he holds the initiative on the battlefield.

In 2023, Donald Trump had promised that, if he won the presidency, “we will have a horrible war between Russia and Ukraine, I will have them both. I know Zelensky, I know that Putin. It will be done within 24 hours, you look”.

Trump has been in the oval office for more than four months now, but the “horrible war” continues.

On rare occasions, he publicly reprimanded the Kremlin and threatened with new sanctions. Last month, he said: “… There was no reason why Putin drew missiles in civil zones, cities and cities, in the last days. It makes me think that he may not want to stop war, he just hits me and must be treated differently, by` `bank ” or” secondary sanctions? “”

But there was no follow -up. The American president seems to be reluctant to increase the pressure on the Kremlin, reporting rather to Moscow that he wishes to restart American-Russia relations.

After the presidents’ telephone conversation, Putin’s foreign policy advisor Yuri Ushakov, who sat on the call, told journalists: “Trump spoke rather emotionally for prospects for [bilateral] Reports. Trump sees Russia as one of the most important partners in America in commercial and economic matters. “”

President Trump seems determined to continue his rapprochement with Russia, whatever happens in Ukraine.

And Moscow smells that.

“President Trump does not link the continuous dialogue of American peace to the Ukrainian peace process,” was a title in the newspaper of the Russian government Rossiyskaya Gazeta this week.

This does not mean that the Kremlin has completely directed the danger of additional restrictions. The US Senate has threatened with new, difficult new sanctions against Russia if Moscow has no seriousness about diplomacy.

Until now, the Kremlin has been able to divert or bypass the pressure from which it is suffered to make compromises and concessions concerning its war against Ukraine.

It seems confident that he will continue to do so.