0738GMT//Putin mocks Ukraine's children claims; fake Siberian honey

(NOTE: Please allow images to download so that you can see our 'News Matrix' at the bottom of this memo.)

WAR NEGOTIATIONS: Round two of peace talks between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul ended after an hour on Monday without any substantive progress. (COMMENT: This is not unsurprising. Peace talks to end long grinding European wars are a slow process. The main deal cut on Monday in Istanbul was the exchange of more prisoners. This time all seriously wounded prisoners and prisoners will be exchanged. Each side will also transfer the bodies of 6,000 dead soldiers. The sides failed to agree on a ceasefire. Neither side has backed down on their demands.)

Away from the main one-hour peace talks between the two sides, Vladimir Medinsky, the head of the Russian negotiating team and a former culture minister, and Rustem Umerov, Ukraine's defence minister and head of its negotiating team, met for 2-1/2 hours. (COMMENT: These talks must surely be a positive sign.)

UKRAINIAN CHILDREN IN RUSSIA: Putin hosted his top children's welfare official Maria Lvova-Belova in the Kremlin just as talks between Russian and Ukrainian peace negotiators resumed in Istanbul. (COMMENT: This was a typical piece of Kremlin theatre and psychology. The International Criminal Court in the Hague has issued an arrest warrant for both Putin and Lvov-Belova for abducting and brainwashing Ukrainian children. The Kremlin has claimed that it recused them from a war zone. The Kremlin knows that the issue of Ukrainian children has played particularly heavily in European media and has accused Ukraine of putting on a "show" around children.)

OPERATION SPIDER: US and European security officials said on Monday that 20 aircraft may have been destroyed by Ukraine's Operation Spider Web on Sunday when drones emerged from containers on trucks inside Russia to attack airfields, including six Tu-95 and four Tu-22M strategic bombers and an A-50 radar aircraft. (COMMENT: This is less than initially claimed by Ukraine but still a stunning success. It is unclear if Russia is able to make any replacements for the lost aircraft.)

MILITARY RECRUITMENT: Bashkortostan in Siberia announced on Monday that it would reduce bounty payments to men signing up to fight in the Kremlin's war in Ukraine to 1 million roubles ($12,600), down from 1.6 million roubles ($20,000). (COMMENT: This is one of the few reductions in the size of bounties paid out by regional governments and bucks the trend. Bashkortostan is one of the poor remote regions of Russia that has been a major supplier of soldiers since the start of the war. This may be a signifier that the programme has become too expensive or that it is simply oversubscribed. There is no indication that the Kremlin wants to slow recruitment.)

RUSSIA-TURKEY DIPLOMACY: The Kremlin will appoint one of its most seasoned diplomats to be its ambassador in Turkey, the Kommersant newspaper reported on Monday. It said that Sergei Vershinin, a deputy foreign minister, was likely to be transferred to Ankara to replace the outgoing Alexey Erkhov. Vershinin is one of the Kremlin's top Middle East specialists. (COMMENT: Vershinin's likely appointment as Russia's ambassador in Turkey shows just how much emphasis the Kremlin places on good relations with Ankara. It is also an insight into the importance of Russia-Turkey dynamics in the Middle East, especially in Syria. Russia managed to maintain its important air and naval bases in Syria after the Turkey-backed revolution in November and the Kremlin knows that keeping up good relations with Ankara is key.)

TRAIN CRASH: Russian investigators on Monday opened a "terrorist" investigation into the collapse of a road bridge onto a railway line that derailed a train to Moscow, killing seven people. (COMMENT: No direct link to Ukraine has been established over the alleged blowing up of the road bridge and it is generally acknowledged that groups of saboteurs operating across Russia often act independently. Still, this story is playing out heavily across Russian media because it allows it to paint Ukraine as Nazi monsters, attacking Russian civilians. There is, of course, the very real prospect that the bridge collapsed because of the terrible state of Russian infrastructure.)

HONEY: Most of Russia's Altai Honey, the most famous in the country, is actually made outside the Siberian region, Rosselkhoznadzor, the Kremlin's food agency, said on Monday. (COMMENT: Honey, and in particular the famed Altai honey, holds an important place in Russian society. Although Rosselkhoznadzor said that 95% is now made outside Altai, it didn't seem too concerned or interested in imposing geographical restrictions on honey production. The comments were made at a retail conference on provenance.)

NEWS MATRIX:

There is a decent spread on The Memo's News Matrix this morning. The most surprising stories were Bashkorostan reducing the size of its military signing-on bonuses and the provenance of Altai honey. Russian consumers may take a different view but the stories are feel to be of wildly different importance. On the other side of the spectrum, it was no surprise that Russia-Ukraine peace talks broke up without much substantive progress or that Russia blamed Ukraine for a train crash.

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