Today, US Secretary of State Department Antony Blinken will meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at the sidelines of the summit of Arctic Council.
The meeting will take place in Reykjavik, the capital of Iceland this evening.
It should be noted that in the meeting top diplomats of both countries will discuss the further joint actions on the normalization of the bilateral relations between the United States and Russia.
Speaking to Eurasia Diary, Engin Ozer, Turkish expert on international relations, made comments on the Blinken-Lavrov meeting.
Expert noted that Antony Blinken and Sergey Lavrov maybe will discuss the issue of the meeting which is being planned between US President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin in June.
“The meeting is to be planned between Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin in next month. Recently the high representatives of US and Russia have been working on determining the area and the form of the meeting between the leaders of both countries,” expert said.
According to Engin Ozer, the Washington has proposal to Moscow. He assumes that the US could lift sanctions on Russia’s Nord Stream gas project if Moscow avoids the joint economic integration with China.
“The 90 percent of the Second Nord Stream has been completed. Nowadays, the works are going on the completion of the German section of this pipeline,” he said.
Turkish expert pointed out that the leadership of US understands that they will not be able to stop the Nord Stream by the imposing sanctions.
According to him, the US under the Biden administration does not want to continue to put Germany under the pressure.
“The Biden administration is trying to normalize the diplomatic relations with European countries which were deteriorated in the period of Trump presidency,” he noted.
Furthermore, expert stressed that another important issue is to be discussed in the Biden-Lavrov meeting is the security of Ukraine.
“The issue of Ukraine is one of the serious problems impeding the normalization of the relations between US and Russia. Washington and Moscow have not been able to come to the common understanding on Ukrainian issue,” he said.
Touching upon the recent tension in eastern Ukraine, Engin Ozer said it is unlikely that Russia will intervene in Donbas region.
“I do not think that Russia will carry out the military operations in eastern Ukraine as there are NATO troops around the conflict zones there,” he addedş