SOCHI, Russia, May 14, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Moscow and Washington’s top
diplomats said Tuesday they were ready to improve ties, ahead of the
countries’ highest-level talks in nearly a year as President Vladimir Putin
hosts Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
Pompeo arrived in the sunny Black Sea resort of Sochi on Tuesday amid a
raft of disagreements, from arms control to the raging Venezuela and Iran
crises.
At the start of talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, and
before a planned evening meeting with Putin, Pompeo expressed hope the two
rivals could “stabilise the relationship”.
“I am here today because President (Donald) Trump is committed to improving
this relationship,” he said.
“We have differences — each country will protect its own interests and
look after its own people — but it’s not that we have to be adversaries on
every issue.” Lavrov said Russia was ready to open a new page in ties.
“I believe it’s time to start building a new, more responsible and
constructive model of mutual perception of each other,” he said.
“We understand that a lot of suspicions and biases have accumulated on both
sides. We win nothing from this.”
Pompeo’s visit to Russia — his first as Secretary of State — came as
tensions mounted dangerously in the Gulf, with Iran and the United States
engaged in a new war of words over Tehran’s nuclear deal.
Pompeo is the highest-ranking US official to see Putin since last July,
when Trump met him in Helsinki.
Then, Trump stunned the US political establishment by appearing to accept
the Russian leader’s statement at face value that he did not meddle in the US
election, contrary to US intelligence evaluations.
Pompeo was greeted on arrival by local officials including the mayor of
Sochi, with whom he exchanged pleasantries on the tarmac.
– Sabre-rattling –
Ahead of the negotiations Putin toured a top military flight test centre in
southern Russia and inspected a new nuclear-capable hypersonic missile dubbed
Kinzhal (Dagger).
His spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied that the display of military muscle was
designed to send a message to the Americans.
At a meeting Monday, Putin also tasked his top brass with developing
defences against hypersonic weapons.
Peskov slammed what he called Washington’s “maximum pressure” campaign on
Iran, saying it would only drive Tehran into a corner.
Pompeo cancelled a stop in Moscow on Monday to instead have an unscheduled
meeting in Brussels with European foreign ministers, who have been
uncomfortable with the hawkish direction of the United States on Iran.
The United States has pulled out of the nuclear deal which was backed by
the Europeans, Russia and China and slapped sweeping sanctions on Tehran in
an all-out effort to curb its regional clout.
The United States has recently ramped up the pressure by saying the
deployment to the region of an aircraft carrier strike group and nuclear-
capable bombers was to counter vaguely described threats from Iran.
The renewed diplomacy between Moscow and Washington follows a long-awaited
report by investigator Robert Mueller.
He found that Russia interfered in the 2016 election but that there was
insufficient evidence to conclude that the Trump campaign colluded with
Moscow.
Besides Iran, Washington and Moscow are at loggerheads on an array of
urgent strategic questions, including Venezuela, the Syrian civil war and the
conflict in Ukraine.
The United States has been trying for more than three months to topple
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Pompeo has repeatedly blamed Russia for
giving him a lifeline.
Both the United States and Russia hope to make some progress on arms
control. Moscow is seeking a five-year extension of the New START treaty,
which caps the number of nuclear warheads well below Cold War limits and is
set to expire in 2021.
The Trump administration this year pulled out of another key arms control
agreement, the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty, with NATO allies
saying a Russian missile system was in violation. Moscow has denied the
claims.
Last year Putin revealed a new generation of “invincible” nuclear weapons
and warned of a new arms race if America pulled out of weapons treaties.
– ‘Regime slays dissidents’ –
Trump on Monday announced that he expected a “very fruitful meeting” with
Putin at the G20 summit in Japan next month, only for Peskov to deny
Washington had requested such a meeting.
The US president’s enthusiasm for courting Putin has little support in
Washington, even within his own administration.
The administration has kept up a campaign of pressure including sanctions
on Russia over alleged election meddling and Moscow’s support for armed
separatists in Ukraine.
Pompeo, despite his close relationship with Trump, left little doubt where
he stood in remarks Saturday in California.
“We can see now 30 years on, after the end of the Cold War, that the Putin
regime slays dissidents in cold blood and invades its neighbours,” Pompeo
said.