I'm John Batchel with my colleague Gregory Copley. We moved from one ceasefire to another.

The proposal by the major leaders of European states, Mr. Tusk was there, Mr. Herr Mitz was there,

President Macron was there, Prime Minister Starmarmar all taking the night train from Warsaw to Keefe. That's the only way you can get in.

And meeting with Mr. Zelensky, calling for a 30-day ceasefire right away.

The matter of Istanbul then came up. Let's meet in Istanbul on Thursday the 15th, Zelensky and Putin.

This is the proposal. At this point, there is no guarantee that anyone will be there, although the Secretary of State of Mr. Rubio is said to be headed to Istanbul, and that would mean that Sergei Lavrov, the foreign minister,

might also be there. And there's rumor talk that if Mr. Putin shows up, Mr. Trump will show up.

He's certainly in the region. Gregory, what are they debating? A 30-day ceasefire, an end of the war,

because at no point has the territorial demands of both have anything in

common. They're quite different territorial claims. So what is the best case scenario for Thursday?

Well, I think the best case scenario for Thursday would be if you had a Zelensky Putin meeting, whether Trump's there or not,

and I believe that if Putin was there, Trump would be there.

The outcome would at best, I think, be a short-term, 30-day or so ceasefire, moving toward

a more permanent ceasefire or armistice,

which only gives vague delineation to the borders of the post-conflict states.

So in other words, you'd expect that this would mean that Russia would retain control

of the essentially Russian parts of what was modern-day Ukraine.

In other words, they would retain the Dombas, possibly the Kharkiv-Karkov region,

they would retain Crimea and the like.

And ultimately, Russia would be seeking to legitimize its claim to particularly the Crimea,

but it would be a de facto situation.

Now, we've seen these de facto border situations last indefinitely.

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