Ukrainian officials said Wednesday they see some grounds for optimism following the latest round of peace talks in Istanbul, while a Kremlin spokesperson said the negotiations had yielded no breakthroughs and much work remains to be done before a deal could be sealed that would put an end to the fighting. “I have an optimistic impression of the round of negotiations in Istanbul,” Ukrainian negotiator Mykhailo Podolyak told an online briefing following the talks in Istanbul, at which Moscow said it would scale back its military operations in parts of Ukraine. Russia said it would “radically” scale down its operations near Kyiv and Chernihiv, a pledge that the West dismissed as a ploy to regroup by Russian forces that had taken heavy losses. Ihor Zhovkva, the deputy head of Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office, told the BBC on Wednesday that negotiations had “definitely moved forward.” But intensified bombardment was reported on …