Russia, as it looks, does not want to participate in the negotiations – this opinion was expressed by the European Union’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs Kaja Kallas while speaking to journalists on 30 April.
Kallas, who headed the Estonian government from 2021 to 2024, was responding to a question about the statement of the president of that country Alar Caris.
According to the diplomat, the opportunity to assess “who did what and when” will be after the war is over. She recalled that in 2021, Russia made demands to Europe that NATO return to the 1997 borders.
“So to say that (about a missed opportunity for negotiations – ed.) is clearly falling into these Russian traps. And what it really means to say is that the Russians are always demanding the maximum, asking for something that was never theirs, and then issuing threats and ultimatums. And at the end of the day, there will always be people in the West who will offer them something. So let’s not fall into that trap,” she said.
The EU top diplomat also responded to a question about the risk that without Europe’s dialogue with Russia, other countries will have such a dialogue with Moscow on potentially disadvantageous terms for Brussels or the Baltic states.
“So far we see that Russia does not want to participate in any dialogue. We should not humiliate ourselves by being” beggars”:” please, we are begging you to talk to us.” But we should put them in such a position that they actually move from pretending to negotiate to real negotiations,” Kallas said.
That is why, she said, European Union foreign ministers had on the agenda during their meeting in Cyprus their vision of demands on Russia. The aim is to ensure that Russia does not pose a threat to any country in Europe once the war is over.
“That is why we should really agree on what we want to talk to them about before we talk to them,” she added.
Karis recently opined in a comment to Yle that Europe made a “mistake” in 2022 by not forcing Russia to the negotiating table immediately after the battle for Kiev. He called on the EU to have “its own plans” for Russia.