Turkey “comes closest” among other countries to fulfilling the role as a mediator between Ukraine and Russia on humanitarian issues, the U.N. humanitarian aid chief Martin Griffiths said in a statement on Monday.
Saying he was "impressed" by Turkish efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war, Griffiths also said he will visit Turkey this week to discuss the war eight weeks on.
Briefing reporters at U.N. headquarters in New York, he said: "I'm really impressed by the way Turkey has been able to present itself to both sides as a genuinely valuable and useful host to those talks with all the difficulties."
The U.N. official will meet President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan during his two-day visit on Wednesday and Thursday and discuss a humanitarian cease-fire, evacuation of civilians and humanitarian aid to Ukrainians.
He also said he hoped Turkey will host a humanitarian contact group.
Griffiths also said that humanitarian cease-fires between Ukrainian and Russian forces in Ukraine are not on the horizon right now, but may be possible in a couple of weeks.
Griffiths further added that Russian officials have not yet put local cease-fires at the top of their agenda.
He said that U.N. aid officials are planning to dispatch a humanitarian convoy in the next couple of days into the embattled eastern region of Donetsk and from there, send aid supplies into the Luhansk region.
The announcement came a day after Erdoğan and U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres discussed the Russia-Ukraine war and recent tensions in Jerusalem in a phone call.
The two leaders stressed the importance of the Russia-Ukraine peace talks and efforts in Turkey to settle disagreements between the parties.
Authorities in Ukraine's western and southern regions of Lviv and Dnipropetrovsk reported earlier multiple explosions apparently caused by missile attacks as Russia's invasion of the country continues.
Six people were killed and 11 wounded in Lviv where missiles struck military facilities and a car tire service point, regional governor Maksym Kozystkiy said.
After the sinking of the flagship of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet last week in what the Ukrainians said was a missile attack, the Kremlin had vowed to step up strikes on the capital.
Russia said Sunday that it had attacked an ammunition plant near Kyiv overnight with precision-guided missiles, the third such strike in as many days. Explosions were also reported in Kramatorsk, the eastern city where rockets earlier this month killed at least 57 people at a train station crowded with civilians trying to evacuate ahead of the Russian offensive.
At least five people were killed by Russian shelling in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, on Sunday, regional officials said. The barrage slammed into apartment buildings. The streets were littered with broken glass and other debris.
