Lavrov: Top-Level Contacts of Moscow, West Should Intensify

© RIA Novosti . Mikhail Voskresensky / Go to the mediabankRussia is in favor of intensifying top-level contacts with its Western partners, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday.
Russia is in favor of intensifying top-level contacts with its Western partners, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday. - Sputnik International
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Moscow favors the intensification of top-level contacts with the West and never called for such meetings to be cancelled, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday.

Updated 1:56 p.m. Moscow Time

MOSCOW, October 14 (RIA Novosti) - Moscow favors the intensification of top-level contacts with the West and never called for such meetings to be cancelled, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday.

"I think that nothing can replace contacts in person… We are absolutely in favor of not just keeping these contacts, but of intensifying them," he said. "Russia has never initiated the postponement of scheduled, pre-planned meetings."

Lavrov reminded that the US President was cancelling his meetings with the Russian leadership way before the Ukrainian crisis.

"Long before the [current crisis in] Ukraine, President Obama for some reason got offended on us for Edward Snowden, who all of a sudden showed up in Russia and they decided for some reason that we had something to do with it. It all went so far, that President Obama, feeling offended, has cancelled his visit to Moscow prior to the G20 Summit in St.Petersburg," Lavrov said, adding that he believes, that the US-Russian relations have not benefited from such a decision.

Relations between Russia and the West have deteriorated significantly amid the crisis in Ukraine, as Western politicians and media have repeatedly accused Russia of meddling in Ukraine's internal affairs and aiding independence supporters in the country's southeast.

A number of Western states have imposed several rounds of sanctions on Russia over its alleged involvement in the crisis, a claim Moscow has repeatedly denied. Some planned meetings between Russian and western officials have also been cancelled or postponed.

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