U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held a call on Saturday as Washington pushes for a ceasefire in Ukraine.
The two “discussed next steps to follow up on recent meetings in Saudi Arabia and agreed to continue working towards restoring communication between the United States and Russia,” according to a U.S. readout of the call.
Last week, Ukraine and the U.S. agreed on a proposal for an immediate ceasefire in the war, which Russian President Vladimir Putin launched three years with his full-scale invasion of the country. The U.S.-Ukraine agreement came during a meeting in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, after the Trump administration also had held talks with Russian authorities in Jeddah in February.
Rubio and Lavrov in Saturday’s call “also discussed specific aspects of implementing the mutual understanding reached at the meeting of senior Russian and U.S. officials in Riyadh on February 18,” according to the Russian readout of their conversation.
Late last week, U.S. President Donald Trump’s envoy, Steve Witkoff, met with Putin in Moscow.
During Saturday’s call, Rubio also informed Lavrov of the U.S. strikes against multiple targets in Yemen controlled by Houthi extremists. In response, the Russian minister called for “political dialogue so as to find a solution that would prevent further bloodshed,” according to the Russian readout.
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