Ukraine’s Foreign Minister: Tillerson’s visit confirms that Russia cannot be worked with on the basis of trust
On Thursday, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin commented on the outcome of the meeting of US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, which took place on April 12 in Moscow.
“I believe that his [Tillerson’s] visit demonstrated very clearly, not only in the statements, but also in the logic of what he outlined during the press conference… our mutual thesis is that one can neither collaborate nor talk to Russia on the basis of trust. During the visit, incidentally, what Tillerson said during the G7 Foreign Ministers Meeting was definitely confirmed: “We are prepared to do more for Ukraine. Everyone sitting around this table must also do more. And this is very important,” the minister stated.
He believes that Tillerson’s visit to Russia is a pressure step, “so that it [Russia] starts, finally, to act on the logic of withdrawing from the Donbas”.
Klimkin added that already at the “Ukraine – North Atlantic Treaty Organization” meeting, the US assured Ukraine that it would always advocate support of the Ukrainian state, and that the sanctions introduced due to the conflict in the Donbas would remain in force until the full implementation of the Minsk agreements.
“We frankly discussed the current state of US-Russia relations. I expressed the view that the current state of US-Russia relations is at a low point and there is a low level of trust between our two countries.
The world’s two foremost nuclear powers cannot have this kind of relationship. We further discussed approaches to improving our channels of communication. We had a lengthy exchange of views regarding the situation in Syria and shared perspectives on possible ways forward,” Tillerson said after the negotiations.