I'm John Bachelors with Anatole Leavon of the Quincy Institute for a responsible

statecraft.

War, war, war, money, confrontation, and violence.

That's beginning the year in the third winter of the war in Ukraine.

Except there's this.

Ukraine and Russia trade, hundreds of prisoners

and largest swap to date.

Anatole we talked about the possibility of conversation of dialogue, of exchanging notes between

Moscow and Kief and Brussels in Washington.

We talked about that at the end of the year.

Is this prisoner exchange in any fashion a way of negotiation

for an armistice or a ceasefire for both sides.

We have a couple of minutes.

Well, it shows that there is still a willingness,

you know, to maintain some contacts and go on talking. So far that is nowhere near an actual peace

initiative. But of course now the Ukrainian government, the Ukrainian military, the Biden administration

are all following a strategy of Ukraine standing on the defensive because the Ukrainian offensive last year failed so badly and with such huge losses.

And, you know, there is the fear now that Russia will launch a new massive offensive at its own.

But of course, if Ukraine is going to stand definitely on

the defensive well then that implies that de facto it is not going to recover the territories that it has lost which you know

obviously indicates that at some point the Ukrainians will start talking about a ceasefire.

The question now is whether the Russians have any incentive

...