Trump Administration has yet to respond to Moscow's proposal of reopening bilateral channel on Ukraine - Lavrov
MOSCOW. June 23 (Interfax) - Moscow has not received an explicit answer to its proposal of reopening a bilateral channel of communication with Washington on Ukraine, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said.
"As you know, there used to be a bilateral U.S.-Russia channel on the level of representatives of the Department of State and the Russian Presidential Administration. The Americans had similar bilateral channels with Berlin, Paris and Kyiv. Under the current circumstances, when [U.S. Secretary of State] Rex Tillerson visited us in April, when I visited Washington DC and met with Donald Trump and Rex Tillerson in May of this year, we discussed the Ukraine crisis and reiterated our readiness to reopen that bilateral channel if the Administration of Donald Trump deemed that to be expedient," Lavrov told the Belarusian media in an interview.
"We believe it would be useful but we have yet to receive any specific response to our interest," the minister said.
As to the opinion that Minsk-2 has reached its limits and that the United States should be engaged in the 'Normandy format', Lavrov said, "I have not heard any serious talk suggesting that the Minsk Agreements have run their course."
"The frivolous one abounds. Most of it [talk] is being heard from Kyiv, practically from the very moment the Minsk Agreements were signed," Lavrov said.
"We, still at the Obama Administration stage when these questions were put to us, we replied that as long as our European partners who, together with us are helping to advance the 'Normandy format' as a means of outside assistance with implementation of the Minsk Agreements, are ready for it, we will not be against our U.S. colleagues getting involved. But then it was decided that cooperating with the Americans should be an addition to the Normandy format rather than within this mechanism," the Russian minister said.