Russia hopes humanitarian corridors in Ukraine start working on March 8

By Elena Teslova

MOSCOW (AA) - Russia hopes the humanitarian corridors in Ukraine will start working on March 8, the head of the Russian delegation for peace talks with Kyiv said Monday.

The third round of negotiations, held today in Belarus’s Brest region, did not meet expectations, Vladimir Medinsky told reporters after the meeting.

"We had long discussed the problem of humanitarian corridors today about which we agreed at the previous meeting but which absolutely did not work because of the refusal of Ukraine's armed forces at the spots to implement the orders of their commanders," Medinsky said.

At the third round of talks, the Russian delegation “put the matter bluntly” of getting humanitarian corridors working, he stressed.

"We hope that starting tomorrow these corridors will finally work. The Ukrainian side gave us its reassurances about that," he said.

Apart from humanitarian issues, the sides discussed political and military aspects, “but it is going on not so easily, and it is too early to talk about anything positive,” Medinsky noted.

"I can only say that we came with a big set of documents. We brought concrete agreements, projects, proposals and hoped that we would be able to sign at least a protocol about those points that had been already agreed upon," he continued.

However, the Ukrainian side took the documents for consideration, refused to sign anything, and only promised to return to them at the next meeting, he added.

"Our expectations from the talks were not met, but we hope that next time we will be able to make a more significant step forward. The negotiations will be continued," he said.

Russia's war on Ukraine, which began on Feb. 24, has drawn international condemnation, led to financial sanctions on Moscow, and spurred an exodus of global firms from Russia.

At least 406 civilians have been killed and 801 others injured in Ukraine since the beginning of the war, according to UN figures. But the international body has maintained that conditions on the ground have made it "difficult to verify" the true number of civilian casualties.

More than 1.7 million people have also fled to neighboring countries, the UN Refugee Agency said.