U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Sullivan brought Washington's written response to Moscow's demands for security guarantees to the Russian Foreign Ministry on Wednesday evening, the Russian daily Kommersant reported
The publication published a photo of Sullivan, who is on his way to the Russian Foreign Ministry with a folder of documents. It also indicates that he delivered two documents, one from the United States and one from NATO.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Telegram that Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grushko received U.S. Ambassador Sullivan in Moscow at his request.
"During the meeting, the head of the American diplomatic mission handed over a written response from the US Administration to the draft bilateral treaty on security guarantees previously submitted by the Russian side," Zakharova said in the message.
As a reminder, the Russians demanded that the US respond in writing to their security ultimatums. In particular, Russia proposed that NATO countries undertake commitments "excluding further expansion of NATO, including the accession of Ukraine, as well as other states."
In addition, Russia proposes to refuse "to conduct any military activities on the territory of Ukraine, as well as other states of Eastern Europe, Transcaucasia and Central Asia. It is also proposed to give up military exercises at a certain distance from the borders of Russia and NATO countries.
On 21 January, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held talks in Geneva.
Before that Blinken visited Berlin and said that he did not expect any breakthrough from the talks with Lavrov, but hoped to hear what Moscow decided as a result of consultations with the US and NATO.
On Jan. 19, Blinken warned during a visit to Kiev that Russian President Vladimir Putin might order an attack as soon as possible.
After the talks, Lavrov said that Blinken promised to provide a written response to the Kremlin's security ultimatums next week (Jan. 24-30).
