Prior to the meeting, the Kiev delegates held a meeting with officials from Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom, with the aim of coordinating positions, before meeting with Russian representatives, according to the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Meanwhile, the head of the Russian delegation, Vladimir Medinsky, reported that he will maintain “some contacts” outside the meeting on the crisis in Ukraine in the Turkish city of Istanbul.

The heads of the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and intelligence services, Hakan Fidan and Ibrahim Kalin, respectively, will participate in the negotiations.

On May 28, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov announced that the next round of direct talks between Moscow and Kiev would take place on June 2 in Istanbul, where Russia would present the Ukrainian delegation with its terms of reference for an agreement to end the conflict.

On May 16, the Russian and Ukrainian delegations resumed direct talks in Istanbul for the first time in more than three years.

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