More than 40 percent of Ukrainians, the highest level since the conflict began, suggested that the time has come to engage in dialogue with the enemy.
In a recent poll, Oleksandr Antybysh, a serviceman, opined that peace negotiations with Russia should be based on several conditions.
“A return to Ukraine’s internationally recognised borders, a ban for Russia to conduct military drills no closer than 300km [186 miles] from Ukraine’s borders,” he said.
For Antybysh, who co-heads a volunteer group that makes gadgets for speedy gun loading in the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv, he wants to see the “full reparation of all losses, material and moral, that have to be calculated by an international commission”.
But the outlook of such conditions seem distant, especially with Moscow slowly and bloodily advancing in Ukraine’s southeast and Kyiv wagging a daring incursion into western Russia.
Russia is currently throwing thousands of barely trained servicemen onto the front lines to push through Ukrainian defences and is pummelling besieged towns and villages with glide bombs, Aljazeera reported.
Even so, in recent months, the Ukrainian president has been cautiously talking about peace talks with Moscow – after more than two years of denying their very possibility.
In mid-July, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia should be invited to the second round of a peace summit in Switzerland.
Russian diplomats were not invited to the first round, which took place in the resort of Burgenstock in mid-June and was attended by representatives of 92 nations.
Two days later, Zelenskyy told the BBC that “not all [occupied] territories should be returned by force”.
“The power of diplomacy may help,” he reportedly added.
His words reflect a growing trend among war-weary Ukrainians who wake up to the wailing of air raid sirens or the heavy, heart-stopping thud of explosions, fumble for matches and power banks among frequent, hours-long blackouts and grieve for enlisted friends and relatives who die or are wounded.
An opinion poll released by the Zerkalo Tizhnya news outlet in mid-July showed that 44 percent of Ukrainians are ready for peace talks – the highest such number since the full-scale Russian invasion began in February 2022.
Only 23 percent of Ukrainians wanted such talks in May 2023, according to a similar poll, when Ukraine was jubilant about Russia’s retreat from several key areas in late 2022 and overwhelmingly believed in the success of an upcoming counter offensive.
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