Grigory Yavlinsky’s website, 9.11.2026

Watch on YouTube choosing your preferred subtitle language

Any steps towards a ceasefire and any attempts to start negotiations must be supported. The main thing is to stop people dying and save human lives. However, today, after more than four years of catastrophe, a ceasefire can no longer be regarded as a solution in itself. It must be inseparably linked to substantive diplomatic negotiations about the future. Otherwise, even the agreements that are reached risk proving temporary and failing to bring about a lasting peace.

The main problem with today’s negotiations is the lack of a clear idea of what the parties want to achieve. There is no understanding of the future of Europe, or of Russia’s relations with Ukraine, Europe, NATO and the United States. Still less is there any shared understanding of the future. Everyone talks about security, but each side understands it in its own way. At the same time, there is virtually no discussion of what the new order of relations that will ensure security in the long term should look like. Without an answer to this question, negotiations will inevitably be reduced to partial, tactical decisions that do not remove the causes of the conflict.

After the Second World War, the leaders of the major powers, despite the deepest contradictions between them, had an idea of the international order they intended to build. The system created at that time, for all its shortcomings, lasted for many decades. Today that entire era has come to an end, the old international institutions are losing their influence, and there is no new vision of the future. Meanwhile, in a world with nuclear weapons, moving towards a new world order through a major war means the threat of a universal catastrophe. That is why diplomacy, dialogue and the search for joint strategic solutions are becoming not merely desirable, but vital.

This is not only about Russia and Ukraine. It is a question of the future of the whole of Europe, of the United States and of international security as a whole. It is not enough to agree on how to stop the war today. We must understand what future peace is being achieved for, how relations between states will be built, and what will make it possible to avoid a repetition of the tragedy. Without a clear vision of the future, without an understanding of the causes of what has happened, and without the political will to create a new security system, no negotiations will be able to secure a strong and lasting peace.

***

Grigory Yavlinsky spoke on the Zhivoi Gvozd YouTube channel about why ceasefire negotiations will not lead to a lasting peace without a shared vision of the future of Russia, Ukraine, Europe and the United States. The full interview is available in the video.

Source