Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky has told British journalist Piers Morgan that he would agree to direct talks with Russia’s Vladimir Putin to end the countries’ nearly three-year long war. Morgan asked him how he would feel if he sat opposite Putin at the negotiating table, to which Zelensky responded: “If that is the only set-up in which we can bring peace to the citizens of Ukraine and not lose people, definitely we will go for this set-up,” but noted that other “participants” would need to be present. So while it was somewhat of an imagined or theoretical scenario, it was the first time Zelensky has ever responded with a positive answer or expressed a willingness to such a proposition. Zelensky has never so much as theoretically acknowledged he’s ready to sit at the negotiating table when asked in prior media interviews. Still, this marks an apparent shift given that throughout the war Zelensky has completely ruled out direct negotiations with Moscow so long as Putin is still in power. He even enshrined it in Ukrainian law. But recently Zelensky suggested that this ban applies to all Ukrainian officials except himself, in the wake of the 2022 decree declaring it “impossible” to engage the Kremlin so long as […]