Gennady Gatilov, Russia’s permanent representative to the UN in Geneva, told the Financial Times that the UN should play a bigger role in efforts to end the conflict and accused the US and other NATO countries of pressuring Ukraine to withdraw from the negotiations. There will be no direct talks between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, he said. “Now, I don’t see any possibility for diplomatic contacts,” Gatilov said. “And the longer the conflict continues, the more difficult it will be to have a diplomatic solution.” His comments, which come despite a flurry of bus diplomacy in recent weeks, are a blow to negotiators who had hoped a recent deal on grain exports from Ukraine’s Black Sea ports could form the basis for a broader agreement. The UN has been mired in “politicization” because of the war and this has “harmed the authority of the UN and its organizations,” Gatilov said. As a result, he is unable to act effectively as a mediator, he complained. “We have no contacts with the Western delegations,” he said of his daily work in Geneva. “On the protocol side we don’t see each other. . . Privately we have no contacts, unfortunately. . . we just don’t talk to each other.” Global diplomacy was at its worst in his 50-year career, Gatilov added. “The world has changed and the United Nations will never be the same.” Russia invaded on February 24, in what Putin called a “special military operation” to “seek out” Ukraine. It was condemned by Western countries, which imposed devastating sanctions on Moscow and severed relations. An initial attempt to capture Kiev in a blitzkrieg failed, forcing Moscow’s army to regroup and focus on an artillery-led campaign in the east. Bilateral ceasefire negotiations collapsed after evidence of war crimes committed by Russian occupation troops was discovered in April. Moscow has denied the accusations. The failure to restart peace talks, combined with continued Western military support for Ukraine, meant it was impossible to predict how long the conflict would last, Gatilov said: “And so [Kyiv and its western supporters] will fight to the last Ukrainian.” Gatilov, who served as deputy foreign minister before being posted to Geneva in 2018, claimed Moscow and Kyiv were “very close” to an agreement that could have ended the conflict at talks hosted by Turkey in April. People involved in the talks denied this. The UN and Turkey have tried to act as intermediaries between Kiev and Moscow and have had recent success brokering a deal on Ukraine’s grain exports. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres visited Volodymyr Zelenskyi this week in an attempt to restart stalled peace talks © Ukrainian Presidency/dpa But Gatilov said it was “unfortunate” that the UN was not playing a bigger role. “I think so [the grain deal] it is the only example that they played a practical role in trying to mediate,” he said. “It should be more than that.” Gatilov accused Western countries of using the situation “as a matter of pressure on Russia, as a tool to isolate Russia. . . harming our position, economically, politically”. “They don’t care about the Ukrainian people, the Ukrainian soldiers,” he said. Ukraine’s defenses have been boosted by more than $30 billion worth of arms supplies pledged by the US, UK and other NATO allies. Zelensky previously said he saw direct talks with Putin as the only way to negotiate an end to the conflict, and only after a Russian withdrawal from all Ukrainian territory it has seized since February. Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser in Zelenskyy’s government who participated in the failed peace talks, said on Friday that “negotiation with the Russian Federation means . . . fatal end for all”.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has maintained ties with Kyiv and Moscow since the invasion, visited Putin in Sochi this month and met Zelensky in Lviv last week along with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in a attempt to act as a mediator. Erdogan said during his visit to Ukraine: “I continue to believe that the war will end at the negotiating table. Mr. Zelensky and Putin have the same opinion.” But that statement made no mention of new developments that could lead to negotiations, according to a person familiar with the discussions. Gatilov praised Erdogan for “trying to facilitate dialogue” but rejected speculation of direct talks between Putin and Zelensky, saying “there was no practical platform to hold this meeting.” He also accused Ukraine of “a clear provocation” at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, which is occupied by Russian forces. Ukraine blamed Russia for bombing the plant, while NATO said Russia was using the nuclear site as a base to launch attacks. “Russian troops are just guarding it. Just ensuring it. Why should we trash it?’ said Gatilov. Russia agreed to an emergency safety visit by the International Atomic Energy Agency to the plant. Additional reporting by Roman Olearchyk and Mehul Srivastava in Kyiv