“Performance for the sake of performance”: two ceasefire experts explain what’s really happening at Russia peace talks

On 17 February, the US, Russia, and Ukraine sat down in Geneva for the first talks on European soil since Russia's full-scale invasion began nearly four years ago. Day one produced no framework. Day two lasted under two hours. Russia demanded all of Donbas, including territory its forces have never managed to capture on the battlefield. Zelenskyy's verdict: "Russia is trying to drag out the negotiations."

The accusation isn't new. Before the full-scale invasion in 2022, Russia waged an eight-year war in eastern Ukraine through proxy forces—and signed 26 ceasefires along the way. None lasted more than two weeks. Over 14,000 people died in what the world called a "frozen conflict." It was never frozen. In May 2017 alone, Ukrainian positions absorbed 945 explosions while the Russian side experienced 145. At some point, this stops being a failure to keep the peace and starts being a strategy.

Russia doesn't sign ceasefires. It wages "ceasefare"—weaponizing truces, pauses, and peace processes to extract concessions, rotate troops, and buy time for the next offensive. When Trump promised to end the war in 24 hours and opened with a ceasefire-first demand, Russia did what it always does: it got the US to drop the condition, then kept showing up to talks stripped of the one demand that might have constrained it.

Three rounds later—Jeddah, Abu Dhabi, Geneva—there is no ceasefire on the table, no framework, and no timeline.

The talks continue. Not because either side believes they will produce peace, but because both have something to lose if they walk away. Ukraine shows up because refusing would hand Russia the narrative that Kyiv is the obstacle. Russia shows up because the process proves it isn't isolated. Trump keeps pushing because he promised peace and hasn't delivered.

The audience for all three performances is the same. The war is not the subject of these negotiations. It's the backdrop.

Each side has its own reason to maintain a process that produces nothing, and Russia already has what it wanted: talks going nowhere while the war goes on.

The structural flaws are the same every time: ambiguous terms, no enforcement, and no attribution for violations. Monitoring a ceasefire today would be exponentially harder—the front line stretches over 1,200 km, more than double the 500 km contact line the OSCE struggled to cover with a fraction of the technology Russia now uses to jam, blind, and obstruct.

On 27 February, US and Ukrainian negotiators meet again in Geneva. A trilateral round with Russia is expected in early March.

Two people who have studied these failures up close spoke with Euromaidan Press days before Geneva opened. Iuliia Osmolovska, director of the GLOBSEC Kyiv office and a former Ukrainian diplomat, previously explained Russia's Soviet-era negotiation tactics for Euromaidan Press. She recently co-authored a policy report for the Atlantic Council arguing that, for Russia, negotiations are warfare by nonmilitary means.

Maryna Domushkina served as a UN mediator on the Black Sea Grain Initiative and spent years monitoring ceasefire violations along the contact line as part of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission—watching Russia break the same agreements she was there to verify.

What follows is their account of how Russia's ceasefire playbook works, why Geneva was never going to break it—and why, knowing all this, both sides keep coming back to the table.

Key takeaways:

• Swapping Kostyukov for Medinsky signals stalling: Russia downgraded from military-technical talks to political posturing, using the "principal-agent trap" to slow everything down
• Russia has violated all 26 ceasefires signed between 2014 and 2020, exploiting the same structural flaws every time: vague language, no enforcement, no attribution for violations
• Modern warfare—especially drones, electronic warfare, and the difficulties in policing a 1,000+ km front line—makes monitoring exponentially harder than in 2014, and Russia will exploit every gap
• Russia has neither reached a "moment of ripeness" nor been forced into a weaker position that would compel genuine negotiation

Interview edited for length and clarity. This conversation took place on 15 February 2026, two days before the Geneva round opened.

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What the delegation swap tells us

Daniel Thomas: For the first time, Russo-Ukrainian peace negotiations are occurring on European soil. Zelensky has said the two sides seem to be talking about different things. Rubio has stated the US doesn't know if the Russians are serious about ending the war. What should we know going into Geneva?

Iuliia Osmolovska: I wouldn't stick too much to the venue. What matters is the composition of the delegations. Americans are still in the game—not as mediators but probably as supervisors who monitor the process.

The switch from Igor Kostyukov [i.e., head of the GRU, Russia's military intelligence agency] to Vladimir Medinsky [i.e., Putin's aide and one of the Kremlin's chief ideologues] is significant. He's not the figure for concrete technical discussions around ceasefire parameters. Russians will first push a broader spectrum of political questions. Then there's the principal-agent trap—the guy leading the delegation doesn't have authority to decide anything. They'll consult back to Moscow, slowing everything down.

The key indicators are as follows: whether technical working groups form alongside the political talks, and how long the talks last. When Russians aren't interested, they limit the time.

[Editors' note: Day two of the Geneva talks lasted under two hours.]

Maryna Domushkina: I can only second that. Three document packages were mentioned previously. The main issues remain territorial questions, the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, and security guarantees.

From spy chiefs to court historians

Thomas: At Abu Dhabi, we saw Kostyukov paired with Budanov—two rival spy chiefs. How does the psychology of the negotiations shift with Medinsky at the helm?

Osmolovska: In previous talks, Budanov's presence alongside Russian military intelligence indicated that the sides were considering a ceasefire and technical issues. Those are the people actually responsible for that work, not vague figures like Medinsky.

When we saw Kostyukov, it was a hint of hope. The prisoner-of-war exchanges after Abu Dhabi reinforced that, not the scale of earlier exchanges (1,000 per side in May and June last year), but 157 from each side still showed progress. Switching back to Medinsky means optimism is much lower than it was heading into Abu Dhabi.

Domushkina: For me, substituting Medinsky is stalling. It's a downgrade from military intelligence to the political level. If you want to stall, you bring politics to the table, not the technical issues, where you can actually reach an agreement.

"If you want to stall the process, you bring politics to the table, not the technical issues where you can actually try to have any type of agreement." —Maryna Domushkina

Why Russia treats ceasefires as weapons, not steps toward peace

Thomas: I want to define a term we'll be using throughout this conversation: "ceasefare." The idea that Russia doesn't use ceasefires as steps toward peace, but as instruments of war—to buy time, rearm, extract concessions, and shift blame when the agreement collapses. What do Western audiences most fundamentally get wrong about how Russia approaches ceasefires?

Osmolovska: I see a systemic error among our partners. For Russia, a ceasefire is not a classic first phase of conflict resolution. It's a loose end to manipulate—a bargaining chip to extract more favorable political terms.

The Russians refuse a ceasefire as a first step. When Trump sought to give impetus to the talks, the Americans insisted on a ceasefire first—temporary, lasting 30 days—then broader negotiations. Russians objected. They convinced the American side to drop the demand. Trump's team started saying the peace settlement should be discussed in broader terms, with a ceasefire folded in. That's exactly how Russians played this.

They also make ceasefire parameters as vague as possible—when it starts, when it ends, who monitors, and penalties for violations.

Before this call, I met a veteran who served on the front line in both wars—2014 and now. When I mentioned ceasefires, he told me the troops were furious. Ukrainian forces were prohibited from firing—even in response. The Russians, meanwhile, kept firing. When the OSCE mission traveled in the field, there'd be a pause. Once the monitors left, Russians resumed firing—and targeted Ukrainian positions precisely because the monitors' movements revealed where forces were located.

"For Russia, ceasefire is not a classic tactical first phase of conflict resolution. It's a loose end to manipulate." —Iuliia Osmolovska

The Minsk playbook: structural flaws Russia exploits every time

Thomas: Maryna, you spent years with the OSCE monitoring mission in Donbas. You saw this up close. Can you walk us through the structural flaws Russia exploited in the Minsk agreements—and what lessons they hold for any future ceasefire?

Domushkina: Russia's strategy is "give us all or nothing." They seek ownership of the negotiation architecture. That's why they've denied ceasefires and refused to implement confidence-building measures since 2022.

Let's be clear: Minsk I and Minsk II are not the same document. Minsk I was concluded under the OSCE within the Trilateral Contact Group—intentionally designed to be low political level, chosen for quick de-escalation. At the time, the conflict was publicly framed as domestic, with separatist armed formations in eastern Ukraine seeking autonomy—a framing that created ambiguity about the extent of Russian involvement and jeopardized all future engagements.

Minsk II and its "Package of Measures" emerged in response to a sharp deterioration on the battlefield, which required a shift to a political process at the head-of-state level—that's how the Normandy Four format was created. Later, the "Package of Measures" signed under this format was endorsed by UN Security Council Resolution 2202. But both Minsk I and II had repeated structural flaws: ambiguous sequencing, no enforcement, no verifiable guarantor roles, and no attribution to violations. When there's no attribution, a ceasefire will not hold.

Based on my experience, a ceasefire with Russia means lower intensity of violence. The battlefield won't be frozen. The longest period with the lowest violations was during COVID, when the whole planet was preoccupied with survival. That tells you something.

Debaltseve: the ceasefire that wasn't

Thomas: One episode really stands out in this whole ceasefire odyssey: the Battle of Debaltseve. Minsk II was signed on 12 February 2015. Days later, Russian-backed forces seized Debaltseve, a Ukrainian town in Donetsk Oblast. What does that tell us about how Russia views the relationship between signing a ceasefire and actually honoring one?

Domushkina: The Battle of Debaltseve ran from the end of January 2015. The Minsk I package was signed on 12 February. But the proxy forces of the so-called Donetsk People's Republic said the ceasefire didn't apply to Debaltseve and continued the offensive until they secured territorial gains, claiming Ukrainian forces were encircled. Putin ridiculed the situation, demanding that Ukrainian forces surrender. Let's remember Ilovaisk—where soldiers were promised a green corridor [i.e., peaceful exit from the battlefield], and many were killed, captured, and tortured. On 18 February, the Ukrainian political leadership chose to withdraw and save lives.

Osmolovska: The second Minsk protocol called for an unconditional ceasefire from 15 February. Despite the signing, proxy forces claimed an implied exemption and continued advancing. We should be prepared: wherever Russians see potential to advance, they'll manipulate exemptions regardless of what's been signed at the highest level.

26 ceasefires, 26 violations

Thomas: You've researched the full record of ceasefires during the eight-year war in Donbas. How many were signed, and how many held?

Osmolovska: We've calculated 26 ceasefires between 2014 and 2020. All were violated. Violations came almost immediately after each agreement was signed. The risk is that monitors will accept small violations as not counting—and Russia will use this gray zone for more advances. A ceasefire will exist de jure, but de facto it won't.

Domushkina: This is Russia's strategy: test the lines. We saw the same with the Black Sea Grain Initiative, signed on 22 July in Istanbul. There was an explicit clause not to attack port facilities in Odesa. The next morning, Russia attacked the port. They claimed it was a mistake, that not all commanders had been notified. Typical Russian language. This is how they test the lines—whether there will be a response, how the other side reacts, how the mediator reacts. It's their playbook.

The energy ceasefires that nobody could define

Thomas: Let's bring this forward to Russia's full-scale invasion. The Abu Dhabi talks produced an energy ceasefire. An earlier energy ceasefire from Riyadh was violated almost immediately. Is this the same playbook we just described with Minsk—partial ceasefires used to extract concessions while the war continues?

Osmolovska: This is a pattern Russia will replicate in future ceasefire negotiations. As someone precisely described it: nobody knew when it started, nobody knew how long it lasted, but everybody knew it was already finished.

Last spring, Trump claimed Putin agreed to a ceasefire over critical infrastructure. Russians said it ran from 11 March to 11 April. Ukrainians understood it to start on 25 March and last until 25 April—because nobody told them otherwise. The same happened with the recent one-week ceasefire: Ukraine learned about it one day before it ended. Russians play with conflicting commitments to different sides, and they'll keep doing it.

"Nobody knew when it started, nobody knew how long it lasted, but everybody knew it was already finished."

Iuliia Osmolovska, on Russia's energy ceasefires

[Editor's note: Russia claimed the energy infrastructure ceasefire began on 18 March 2025, when Putin gave the order after speaking with Trump. Ukraine maintained it took effect on 25 March, when both sides actually stopped striking. The 11 March date refers to when the US and Ukraine agreed to a broader ceasefire proposal in Jeddah, which Russia rejected.]

What a real ceasefire would require

Thomas: Given everything we've discussed—26 violated ceasefires, Debaltseve, the energy pauses, the grain deal—what would a ceasefire with Russia actually need to look like to have any chance of holding?

Osmolovska: The clearer the language on violations, monitoring, verification, and penalties, the better the chances. But we don't see momentum for real ripeness. The switch to Medinsky signals Russians are playing for time, hoping Americans and Europeans give up.

Domushkina: The analytical work exists. We have empirical data from this war on how not to fail a ceasefire. All experts agree that any ceasefire will not be peace—it will be a pause. The question is how to prolong that pause, build clear mechanisms and guardrails, and prevent large-scale violations and save Ukrainian lives.

Concerning monitoring, when the OSCE SMM was operating along the 495 km contact line, monitors already faced continuous impediments to freedom of movement. They could report violations, but couldn't compel compliance. And from 2016 to 2020, when long-range UAVs were introduced, Russia was already jamming them, causing GPS signal loss and crashes. Now imagine that on a front line more than double the length, with far more advanced electronic warfare.

The OSCE was created to observe, verify, and de-escalate. Russia turned it into observe, obstruct, dispute, and delay. Any new monitoring mechanism needs to account for that history—otherwise, we're rebuilding the same structural failures.

"We risk finding ourselves where we were in 2015—everybody thinking the conflict was frozen while people continued to die." —Maryna Domushkina

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Osmolovska: Everything Maryna describes about jamming and access will be exponentially worse. Drones are the eyes and ears of any monitoring regime, and Russia has the tools to blind them.

Domushkina: The devil is in the details. I hope the people in the room take these lessons into account. Otherwise, we risk finding ourselves where we were in 2015—everybody thinking the conflict was frozen while people continued to die.

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Why the talks continue—and what it would take to change them

Thomas: The Geneva talks had no ceasefire on the table, no enforcement framework, and no timeline. There's no indication the next round will either. If a ceasefire isn't even on the table, what purpose does this format serve from a conflict resolution standpoint?

Domushkina: Conflict resolution distinguishes between instrumental negotiation—used tactically—and transformative negotiation, used to actually resolve a dispute. The current talks in Abu Dhabi and Geneva appear closer to the former. It would be naive to ignore that their purpose might also be stalling—for operational regrouping or delaying external pressure.

For Ukraine, participation reinforces compliance with international norms. It underscores that Kyiv does not seek to position itself as the obstacle to peace. For Russia, engagement signals that it is not diplomatically isolated. This does not mean either side is negotiating in good faith, but the signaling function itself has strategic value.

Let's also not forget that negotiations operate as an intelligence environment. Both sides use them to assess internal constraints, clarify actual versus rhetorical red lines, and identify areas of flexibility. It increasingly looks like the parties use the format for exactly this purpose.

The key is to avoid assuming negotiations are only about an immediate ceasefire. Cessation of hostilities is often the last deliverable, not the first. We've already seen issue-specific agreements—prisoner exchanges, attempts at energy infrastructure protection. These are politically easier because they don't force either side to concede core claims.

The existence of talks is not evidence of peace momentum. But their absence would narrow communication channels and reduce future settlement options.

"The existence of talks is not evidence of peace momentum. But their absence would narrow communication channels and reduce future settlement options." —Maryna Domushkina

Thomas: Russia got the US to drop the ceasefire-first demand before talks even began. The side fighting refuses to stop. The side mediating won't insist on a ceasefire as a precondition. What are these talks actually achieving?

Osmolovska: We do not know exactly what is going on behind the scenes. The delegations work on two levels. At the senior political level, Umerov chairs for Ukraine and Medinsky or Kostyukov for Russia. Alongside that, technical groups discuss concrete parameters like ceasefire implementation.

Abu Dhabi focused more on military aspects and tentative ceasefire parameters. This time in Geneva, Russia put Medinsky back as delegation head and added a deputy foreign minister. The focus naturally shifted back to political issues. That does not mean ceasefire wasn't discussed—but Medinsky lecturing on twisted history is more likely the next act in a deliberate performance.

For an external expert, it looks like "performance for the sake of performance." Both sides showing up is treated as progress in US-led peace efforts. They happily highlight this in public comments after each meeting. But US representatives are not professional conflict resolution diplomats. They cannot clearly grasp why classic sequencing matters—ceasefire parameters first, political commitments second—to make solutions lasting. Russia has successfully reversed that order. Fooling the mediators on this point seems to be working so far.

Russia is using these talks to buy time. The hope is that the war's trajectory will worsen Ukraine's position and push Kyiv toward concessions. The composition of Russia's next delegation will reveal more—but Moscow is clearly unwilling to change its sequencing logic.

Thomas: In any of the cases you've studied, has Russia ever agreed to a real cessation of hostilities without being forced into one—militarily or economically?

Osmolovska: It is difficult to analyze it this way. Since gaining independence in the 1990s, Russia has never been an official party in a direct war with another country. It never officially declared war against another state. The conflicts it induced in Moldova, Georgia, and Nagorno-Karabakh ran through local proxies. Russia never claimed direct responsibility. It hid behind "third-party peacekeeper" and "observer" labels. The Chechen wars were framed as internal domestic issues, justifying direct force to suppress independence movements.

In all of these conflicts, the ceasefires concluded with Russia's engagement were not fully observed. The common denominator: Russia agreed to a ceasefire only when the political settlement's language was vague enough to manipulate—allowing it to achieve its goals through political means instead.

Thomas: Medinsky quoted Napoleon: "War and negotiations happen simultaneously." North Vietnam called the same approach "Talk-Fight." Is that what Russia is doing at Geneva—using negotiations as cover while the war continues on its terms?

Osmolovska: Russia uses negotiations while working vigorously to deepen negative alternatives for Ukraine. The answer is clear: Russia does not want to negotiate in good faith now. It is not ready. It has neither reached a moment of ripeness nor been forced into a weaker position. Until either happens, Russia will keep playing this "catch me if you can" game.

"Russia has neither reached a moment of ripeness for negotiations nor been put into a weaker position that would force it to maneuver. Until either happens, it will be playing this 'catch me if you can' game." —Iuliia Osmolovska

Iuliia Osmolovska is a Ukrainian negotiation and conflict-resolution expert who served for 15 years as a diplomat. She has recently published a policy report with the Atlantic Council on Russian negotiation strategies. Maryna Domushkina is a peace and security expert who served as a UN mediator in the Black Sea Grain Initiative and worked at the OSCE's Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine (SMM). Her work with the SMM included direct experience working in the Minsk framework.