Austria hopes for a quick return to peace talks on Ukraine – Foreign Minister in an interview with BILD

Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg spoke with these words in Kyiv in a conversation with BILD Deputy Editor-in-Chief Paul Ronzheimer.

“Of course, we hope that very soon – according to my expectations, sooner rather than later – there will be a return to the logic of negotiations. <…> Peace is always achieved at the negotiating table and never on the battlefield,” the minister said. Kyiv is against this development of events. One member of the Ukrainian government told BILD: “Even if pressure from Brussels continues to increase, we will not negotiate. There is no possibility for this.” “We need further successes before the end of the year to show that we are winning this war,” a Ukrainian diplomat told BILD.

“The situation for Ukraine now is not less, but more threatening. The counteroffensive is proving less successful than the Ukrainians and the West would like. There are small partial successes, but there is no sign of a breakthrough to the Black Sea, and resistance from the Russians remains significant, Ronzheimer writes. — The mood in the Ukrainian government is changeable. When you talk with its influential representatives, you feel, on the one hand, gratitude for the help of the West, but on the other hand, despair because of its pace and the lack of new weapons.”