DOHA: Russian and US diplomats will hold a meeting in Istanbul on February 27 to discuss issues related to the operation of the two countri...
DOHA: Russian and US diplomats will hold a meeting in Istanbul on February 27 to discuss issues related to the operation of the two countries’ embassies, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov announced.
"Such a meeting will take place in Istanbul tomorrow," the top Russian diplomat said at a press conference following his visit to Qatar.
"We have announced that our diplomats and high-level experts will meet to address the systemic problems that have piled up as a result of the previous [US] administration’s illegitimate activities aimed at creating artificial obstacles for the work of the Russian embassy, to which we clearly responded in kind, also creating uncomfortable conditions for the operation of the US embassy in Moscow," Lavrov noted.
According to him, the problem of Russia’s frozen assets "has nothing to do with the operation of embassies" because "the asset issue is a state-level one."
Lavrov expects that the Istanbul meeting "will make it clear how capable the parties are of moving forward quickly and effectively."
Earlier, the top Russian diplomat announced that Moscow and Washington had held two rounds of preliminary technical consultations on the issue.
Russian and US delegations held talks in Riyadh on February 18, which lasted over four hours. Russia was represented by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Presidential Aide Yury Ushakov, and CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) Kirill Dmitriev. The US delegation consisted of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, and Special Envoy for the Middle East Steve Witkoff.
According to Ushakov, the delegations held a serious talk on all the issues they wanted to discuss, including ways to bring Russian and US positions closer to each other and future consultations on Ukraine. Lavrov described the meeting with Washington officials as very useful. According to him, Russia and the US agreed to make sure that ambassadors to both countries are appointed as soon as possible. Rubio, in turn, said after the talks that the US and Russia had agreed to reestablish embassy staffing. Embassy staff cuts began in both countries after 2014, when Washington adopted a policy aimed at "systemic containment" of Russia.
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