Members of Russian delegations are polite during closed-door negotiations, but not authorized to make decisions. They are a mouthpiece for the Kremlin and are afraid to convey bad news about the real state of affairs "upstairs". This was stated by former Minister of Defense Oleksii Reznikov in an interview with Radio Svoboda, as reported by UNN.
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According to Reznikov, who was a member of the first delegation in direct negotiations with Russia after the full-scale invasion in 2022, Russians behave "delicately, diplomatically, with respect for their counterparts... trying to convey their position or the position of their leadership" during closed-door negotiations.
"But as soon as they went out to the media – they were like different people. Because they had to send a signal to their audience, and something completely different was being told. Because they were selling what they wanted to hear there, not what was happening inside the room," Reznikov added.
At the same time, during the negotiations, they cannot make any decisions, only relay the words of the Kremlin leadership.
"In my opinion, none of them had any subjectivity, any mandate for real negotiations in terms of reaching an agreement. They performed a function. They were told what they had to say, perhaps with small fluctuations. But we achieved some positive results. We agreed on humanitarian corridors to save civilian lives: Volnovakha, Berdiansk, Mariupol... Thousands of people were saved," Reznikov recalled.
At the same time, members of Russian delegations do not transmit data to Moscow about the real state of affairs at the front. Reznikov said that when he tried to organize the first large-scale body exchange, discussing it with Russian President's aide Vladimir Medinsky, he encountered a lack of understanding.
"I say, according to our military reports, we already have three thousand bodies of your soldiers on our controlled territory. We know that all morgues in Belarus are full, according to intercepts. We know that, in addition to morgues, you use mobile crematoria. We know this for sure. But three thousand bodies are lying there. While it's cold, they just lie there, but then they'll start to rot, and we are ready to give them back to you. Let the Red Cross help, but we want to take ours and bury them, give them back to their families. Medinsky was very surprised. He looked at Oleksandr Fomin, who was then Serhiy Shoigu's deputy. He had a poker face: we don't confirm it, we have 60 dead from COVID and that's it," Reznikov said.