Russia, Ukraine and the US met for a second time this week for trilateral talks to discuss a possible cessation of hostilities. Once again little was resolved apart from a prisoner swap, something that has happened several times over the four years of the full-scale conflict between the two countries.
The lack of any substantive breakthrough was fairly predictable, given the circumstances. This week’s meeting got off to the same depressing start as the first one had the week before. On February 3, the night before the three sides gathered in Abu Dhabi, a massive barrage of 521 drones and cruise missiles once again targeted critical civilian infrastructure in Ukrainian cities, including the capital, Kyiv.
And while the talks were in full swing, Russia followed up on its nighttime strikes by deploying cluster munitions against a market in Druzhkivka, one of the embattled cities in what remains of Ukraine’s fortress belt in the Donetsk region.
