Brazil, China call for direct talks as the “only way to end the conflict” between Russia and Ukraine.

Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has pledged to press his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to attend negotiations with Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Turkiye, adding to growing international pressure on Moscow to enter talks and end its three-year war.

Lula is expected to stop in the Russian capital on the way back from attending a regional forum in China.

“I’ll try to talk to Putin,” Lula said at a news conference in Beijing on Wednesday before his departure.

“It costs me nothing to say, ‘hey, comrade Putin, go to Istanbul and negotiate, dammit,'” he said.

The negotiations, expected to take place on Thursday in Turkiye’s commercial hub, Istanbul, would be the first direct talks between Kyiv and Moscow since 2022, shortly after Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbour.

Lula’s comments come after the Ukrainian foreign minister urged Brazil to use its influence with Russia to secure a face-to-face meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy.

Brazil and China issued a joint statement on Tuesday calling for direct negotiations as the “only way to end the conflict”.

Zelenskyy earlier dared Putin to meet him in Turkiye, saying if he does not show up, it would show that Moscow is not interested in peace.

He also urged United States President Donald Trump, currently on a tour of Middle Eastern countries, to also visit Turkiye and participate in the talks.

Trump had announced that US Secretary of State Marco Rubio would participate in the talks in Istanbul.

A State Department official said Rubio was expected to be in Istanbul on Friday.

But the Kremlin has not yet specified whether Putin will attend in person, stating only that the “Russian delegation will be present”.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday that Moscow would disclose the makeup of its own delegation to Turkiye once Putin gave the order.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was quoted by Russian news agencies as saying Moscow was ready for serious talks on Ukraine, but doubted Kyiv’s capacity for negotiations.

Peskov also condemned comments made by French President Emmanuel Macron that Paris was open to deploying nuclear-armed warplanes in other European countries.

On Tuesday, Macron told France’s TF1 television that nuclear arms proliferation would not enhance the continent’s security.

“The Americans have the bombs on planes in Belgium, Germany, Italy, Turkey,” he said, adding, “We are ready to open this discussion. I will define the framework in a very specific way in the weeks and months to come.”

With France as the European Union’s only nuclear-armed nation, discussion to place bombers in other countries across the bloc is growing after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

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Al Jazeera and news agencies