MOSCOW (Reuters) -The Kremlin on Friday dismissed speculation that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov had fallen out of favour with Vladimir Putin after efforts to organise a summit between the Russian president and Donald Trump were put on ice last month.
Lavrov, 75, a veteran Soviet-era diplomat known for his robust negotiating style, was absent from a big Kremlin meeting this week that he would typically attend, and Putin chose someone else to attend a G20 summit in South Africa later this month, a role that Lavrov has filled in the past.
For two weeks in a row the Foreign Ministry has also not disclosed Lavrov’s travel plans and speaking engagements for the following week.
The developments have fuelled speculation that Lavrov, who has served as foreign minister for more than two decades, may have fallen from Putin’s good graces due to the collapse of plans for the summit in Budapest.
Asked on Friday if Lavrov was in trouble with Putin, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov dismissed the idea.
“I will give you a brief answer: there is nothing true in these reports,” Peskov told reporters.
Asked to confirm that Lavrov would continue to work in his current role, Peskov added: “Absolutely. Lavrov is working as foreign minister, of course.”
Lavrov spoke by phone to U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on October 20 to discuss the possible summit, days after it was announced by Trump following a phone call with Putin.
The next day, Trump said that he did not want to hold a meeting that would be “a waste of time”. He later said he had cancelled the summit because it “just didn’t feel right”.
Trump has sought a rapprochement with Moscow and held a summit in Alaska with Putin in August. But he has backed calls for an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine with forces at their present positions, while Moscow has said it wants Kyiv to yield more territory.
Reuters and other media reported that Washington called off the new summit after Lavrov’s ministry sent a message indicating Moscow was not prepared to yield on hardline demands over Ukraine. Britain’s Financial Times cited a source as suggesting that Lavrov’s conversation with Rubio had put Washington off.
“Lavrov is clearly tired and seems to think he has better things to do than engage with the U.S., whatever Putin may want,” the FT cited the source as saying.
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova suggested on Friday that the FT article had been published to stoke speculation that was unhelpful to Moscow and part of what she called a hybrid war against Russia.
Putin has made it clear that, aside from the Ukraine issue, he believes that a rapprochement between Moscow and Washington is in Russia’s national interest and important for global security, as the two countries possess vast nuclear arsenals.
(Reporting by Gleb Stolyarov and Dmitry Antonov;Writing by Andrew OsbornEditing by Mark Trevelyan, Peter Graff)
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