No, of course Russias doesn't care in a humanitarian sense. They are purely transactional, and hence the curiosity around what they "get" for pausing their brutality. I mean - there are lots of reports of them funelling evacuees into Crimea or russian occupied land, so this is kidnapping by other means. Those people are now fresh slaves, and will never see Ukraine again without escaping.

RE: your point about negotiations - Russia's tradition is maximalist demands. Demand everything, compromise nothing, and wait for the feckless pussies to give you something you didn't have before, because.....they always will. They want peace more than you do, so why compromise anything? This is a childish tactic, but they're a childish country. They don't have the same leverage than they have had in past conflicts though, becuase Ukraine is on what's called 'death's ground'. There is not really much for Ukraine to compromise on.

Nobody expects this malevolent version of the Russian Federation to honor any peace long term, which wipes a lot of the tangible negotation pieces right off the board.

If Putin died today, they war would end. But I think there are still a lot of ways he can survive for several more years even if they simply froze the conflict. Russians will be furious with the piddling return they got on this war, but what are they going to do? There is no organized resistance and Putin has shown high skill in staying on top of even the tiniest ember of local rivals. He is still the intelligence services' chosen avatar to run the state, and there's a case to be made that his Rough Daddy act might be exactly what Russia needs to endure the next decade of domestic gangsterism as the war veterans return home to a permanetly lessened economy at home.