Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy agreed to hold face-to-face peace talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Istanbul on May 15, after the coalition of the willing called the Russian leader out and gave him an ultimatum to start a 30-day ceasefire on Monday or face “crushing” sanctions.

Putin held a rare midnight press conference on May 10 to head off a fresh crisis and said he was willing to meet Zelenskiy for talks with “no preconditions” on May 15 in Istanbul.

“I will be waiting for Putin in Türkiye on Thursday. Personally,” Zelenskiy said in a statement issued late on May 11. His office confirmed to Financial Times that travel arrangements were under way. Framing the offer as a test of Russia’s sincerity, Zelenskiy added: “I hope that this time the Russians will not look for excuses.”

If the talks go ahead it will be the first time the two men have met since the war started over three years ago. Istanbul was the venue for the failed 2022 Istanbul peace deal that nearly brought the conflict to an end after its first month. Putin has suggested several times that peace talks resume in the Istanbul format, but so far Bankova (Ukraine’s equivalent of the Kremlin) has rejected the suggestion.

Putin called Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on May 11, who said he was willing to host the meeting and hoped that it would result in concrete steps towards a lasting ceasefire.

Putin rejected the proposed 30-day unconditional ceasefire beginning on May 11 proposed by a meeting of the top four leaders of the coalition of the willing (CoW4) – Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, French President Emmanuel Macron, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and the newly installed German Chancellor Friedrich Merz – who travelled to Kyiv over the week to demand Putin halt the hostiles of face a new wave of extreme sanctions that would target Russia’s shadow fleet and banking sector amongst other things.

Zelenskiy reaffirmed Ukraine’s position, saying the country “awaits a full and lasting ceasefire, starting from tomorrow, to provide the necessary basis for diplomacy”. However, over the course of the weekend, he also admitted the chance of Russia complying with the demand to implement a pause were poor. “We have no illusions that the ceasefire will be breached,” Zelenskiy said at the weekend.

A peaceful settlement of the conflict in Ukraine is a much more complex and demanding process than a formal signing of a document, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. 

"The settlement in Ukraine is a very difficult thing. This does not just mean putting a signature on paper, for status, and proclaiming it as an agreement. This is a settlement process filled with the smallest of details. And each of these details is extremely important for both Russia and Ukraine," he said in an interview with ABC News.

US President Donald Trump seems to have played a key role in Zelenskiy's decision. Writing on his Truth Social “Ukraine should agree to this, IMMEDIATELY”, the US president has indicated that he is becoming tired of the talks that kicked off in Riyadh on February 18 and have now largely stalled.

“At least they will be able to determine whether or not a deal is possible. If it is not, European leaders, and the US, will know where everything stands, and can proceed accordingly!”

Trump also expressed doubt over Ukraine’s willingness to reach a settlement, saying he was “starting to doubt that Ukraine will make a deal with Putin”.

Zelenskiy has made some progress in improving his relations with Trump following the shouting match between two presidents on February 28 at a press conference in the White House. Bankova also signed off on a hard negotiated mineral deal on April 31 that Trump has been promoting as a means to support Ukraine that saw some US military deliveries to Ukraine restart the next day.

Zelenskiy is clearly calculating that following Trump’s endorsement of the Putin proposal to meet, he cannot afford to cross the US president and refuse the talks for fear of losing Trump’s backing again.

Putin has been playing a similar game, as neither of the two protagonists want to be painted as the obstacle to a resolution to the talks. Putin called a 30-hours ceasefire over the Easter week and another 3-day ceasefire during the Victory Day parade in Moscow on May 9, which analysts say was designed to signal to Trump the Kremlin is willing to negotiate.

The last time the two presidents last met in person was in December 2019 during peace talks in Paris brokered by then German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron. Zelenskiy was only a few months into his job as president and looked out of his depth.

Any talks between the two men now will not be any easier. Political analyst and founder of the R.Politik think tank Tatiana Stanovaya believes that differences between the Russian and Ukrainian positions make them irreconcilable.

Zelenskiy has consistently said that he is not willing to start talks until there is a comprehensive ceasefire in place on land, sea and in the air. Putin has said no ceasefire is possible until the “root causes” of the conflict are addressed, starting with Ukraine giving up its ambition to join Nato.

Russian presidential foreign policy adviser Yuri Ushakov said negotiations in Istanbul should be based on the aborted peace process from early 2022 and on the “real situation on the ground”, where Russia currently holds military advantage.

Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova told state news agency Tass that Ukraine had “misread” Putin’s message. “Putin said it very clearly: negotiations about the initial reasons [for the war] first, then a conversation about a ceasefire,” she said. Moscow is also demanding recognition of its annexation of four south-eastern regions, and a freeze on Western arms deliveries to Ukraine before a ceasefire is possible.

French President Emmanuel Macron, who was in Kyiv at the weekend, welcomed Putin’s offer to meet this week, saying it was “a first move, but it is not enough”. Speaking from a train in Przemyśl, Poland, he added: “It’s unacceptable for the Ukrainians because they can’t accept parallel discussions while they continue to be bombarded.”

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk echoed that stance in a post on social media platform X, writing: “The world, however, is waiting for a univocal decision on an immediate and unconditional ceasefire. Ukraine is ready. No more victims.”

Stanovaya said in a social media post that the agreement to start talks does not indicate:

that Putin fears new sanctions and has shifted his position under pressure;

that he is reconsidering his war aims or open to concessions;

that he intends to scale back military strikes; and

that he is genuinely seeking an agreement with Zelensky.

Stanovaya said what it does mean is, “Putin sees an opportunity to draw Ukraine into an “Istanbul-2” process, closely resembling the talks of March–April 2022, to pursue the same objectives—now including the newly annexed territories. His aim is to stall Western arms deliveries, exploit any weakening of Zelensky’s position, and exacerbate Ukraine’s internal instability. He also wants Kyiv to lift its ban on talks with Russians, which would allow broader outreach within Ukraine. He does not believe, even for a moment, that Kyiv in its current state can agree to Russian terms.

“The reality is that neither Moscow nor Kyiv is ready to agree to a durable peace, as their positions are fundamentally irreconcilable,” Stanovaya said, adding that without a change in leadership in Russia or a military breakthrough, “a sustainable ceasefire is not currently achievable objectively.”