Kremlin focuses on draft 2022 deal for proposed peace talks

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin's proposed peace talks with Ukraine will take into account an abandoned 2022 draft deal between the two countries and the reality of Russia's control over almost a fifth of Ukraine, the Kremlin said on Sunday.

Putin on Sunday proposed direct talks with Ukraine aimed at bringing a durable peace to end the war, an initiative welcomed by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who said Kyiv was willing to talk but that Moscow must first agree to an immediate ceasefire.

Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters after Putin's early-morning statement that the proposed talks would take into account both the draft abandoned in 2022 and the current situation on the ground.

Days after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Russia and Ukraine began talks in Belarus that later moved to Istanbul. A draft agreed there setting out a framework for a possible settlement became known as the "Istanbul Communique".

The talks broke off in May, but Russian officials have long argued that a settlement can be reached along the lines of the Istanbul Communique. Steve Witkoff, U.S. President Donald Trump's special envoy, has also referred to the 2022 draft as a possible guide to future peace.

Under the draft, a copy of which Reuters has reviewed, Ukraine would agree to permanent neutrality in return for international security guarantees from the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council: Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States, and other nations including Belarus, Canada, Germany, Israel, Poland, and Turkey.

Ukraine essentially agreed provisionally to non-nuclear neutrality and not being a member of the NATO military alliance in return for a security guarantee which, if Russia invaded, would oblige the United States and its allies to fight Russia directly.

The question of territory in the 2022 draft was secondary to the security guarantee - seen by diplomats on both sides as by far the biggest hurdle to peace.

Ukraine, after being invaded, wanted its security to be guaranteed but the United States and its allies were wary of locking themselves into a future war with Russia.

Under the 2022 draft, Ukraine's path towards possible European Union membership would be facilitated and Russia wanted limits on Ukraine's armed forces, and the repeal of laws that Moscow considers discriminatory against Russian speakers, according to Reuters reporting.

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Helen Popper and Kevin Liffey)