MOSCOW, April 20. /TASS/. An expert group in charge of rectifying relations between Russia and the US will focus on precisely specified problems and will draw up proposals for the two countries’ presidents, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told Kommersant Daily.
"Some sort of a mechanism will be set up in all likelihood," he said. "This won’t be a momentous structure involving specialists from a multitude of organizations. This will be an entity with much flexibility that will be able to alter its configuration depending on the specific issues."
"However, we haven’t gotten as far as formalization of this work, or making an official announcement about who will chair this mechanism on both sides," Ryabkov said.
"Cause number one is the absence of appointments on the US side," he said. "On the whole, the process of filling vacant positions is rather slow but we treat this slow pace with understanding."
Still the sides reached a firm conclusion upon the outcome of talks with the US Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, in Moscow last week that a precisely targeted entity to steer the rectification of bilateral relations was needed, Ryabkov said.
"The presumption is this group will be functioning without excessive rhetoric or allusions to the past (although it’s scarcely possible to avoid them altogether), and that its members will focus on concrete issues," he went on. "I think they will be offering proposals and ideas that would help their leaders to clear up the mudslides generated by the previous US Administration."
"As for me - and if they entrust this work to me then I’m really going to start off with this - the solution of humanitarian problems is imminent," Ryabkov said. "I mean first and foremost the problems that have stuck in our relations like painful splinters."
"Their scope includes, among other things, the plight of pilot Konstantin Yaroshenko and the arbitrary detentions of Russian citizens in third countries on American warrants without due notifications of the Russian side," he said.
"There’s a range of other serious problems that require an all-round analysis and political solutions at the top state level," Ryabkov said. "The case in hand, for instance, is the restrictions that Russian individuals and legal entities come to grips while making transactions in U.S. dollars. This is because the U.S. banking system is pegged to the supervisory agencies where the sanctions saga created during the Barack Obama presidency is permanently in the air."