What did 6 March 2022 reveal about diplomacy?

What did diplomacy look like on 6 March 2022, the eleventh day of Russia's invasion of Ukraine? Judged by the reports from that day and the one before, it was busy, and it ran alongside continued fighting, mass arrests in Russia and tightening economic pressure.

Calls and offers to mediate

The day's most notable exchanges involved Vladimir Putin, the Russian president. In a phone call with Emmanuel Macron, the French president, Putin said Russia would no longer attack nuclear power plants and was open to a trilateral meeting between Russia, Ukraine and the International Atomic Energy Agency.

He also spoke with Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the Turkish president, who called on him to declare a ceasefire. Putin replied that he was ready for dialogue to end the war, but warned that any attempt to draw out negotiations could fail. He also called on Ukraine to cease fighting in order for the military campaign to end.

On 5 March, Naftali Bennett, the Israeli prime minister, met Putin in Moscow to discuss the invasion and a possible ceasefire. Bennett was the first world leader to meet Putin in person since the invasion began. On 6 March Bennett said Israel would try to mediate a ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia even if the attempts did not succeed.

Fighting on the ground

The diplomacy did not pause the war. Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president, said Havryshivka Vinnytsia International Airport in Vinnytsia Oblast had been completely destroyed after being hit by eight Russian ballistic missiles.

A day earlier, the Ukrainian military began a mass evacuation of civilians from Irpin after the city was bombarded by Russian jets and artillery. Much of the city had by then been destroyed, according to reports.

Casualty claims diverged sharply. The Ukrainian military said it had killed more than 11,000 Russian troops since the invasion began, while Russian Defence Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov had said earlier, on Wednesday, that 498 Russian troops had been killed.

Dissent and its limits

Protests against the invasion continued. Around 4,000 anti-war demonstrators were arrested at protests in cities across Russia. In Kazakhstan, which was reported to be concerned about possible sanctions, authorities said they would allow anti-war protests, and demonstrators gathered in Almaty to oppose the invasion.

Economic pressure and digital isolation

On 5 March, Visa and Mastercard suspended operations in Russia, citing Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. Visa said it would cut off transactions over the coming days, and that once a full ban was in place, bank cards issued in Russia would no longer work abroad. The same day, Italian police seized luxury villas and yachts worth 143 million euros from five Russian oligarchs sanctioned by the European Union.

In Russia itself, a government directive published on 6 March ordered government institutions, and the internet service providers serving them, to switch to Russian DNS servers and, where possible, to the .ru domain zone. They were also to replace foreign-hosted Javascript code with equivalent code hosted in Russia by 11 March. Russian authorities did not plan to cut the country off from the global internet.

A day of parallel tracks

Taken together, the reports show several tracks running at once: Putin's offers of dialogue paired with conditions, third-party leaders volunteering to mediate, missile strikes and evacuations, and a widening set of financial and technical measures. Russia's stated willingness to hold talks on nuclear plant safety was a concrete point that emerged from the Macron call. Beyond that, the day's reports record offers and warnings rather than agreements.