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All contacts with US leader important but some details not for comment — Kremlin

The Washington Post said earlier this week that the US president might have shared with Russia's foreign minister and ambassador in Washington some secret information

US President Donald Trump and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov Alexander Shcherbak/TASS

US President Donald Trump and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov

© Alexander Shcherbak/TASS

SOCHI, May 17. /TASS/. The Kremlin attaches great priority to all contacts with the US leadership but not all details of negotiations become available to the media, Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov said about media debates over the May 10 meeting US President Donald Trump had with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, including speculations the US leader had shared some secret information with Russia’s top diplomat.

"Any contact with the president of a country like the United States is important and valuable," Ushakov said, when asked how precious the information Trump shared with Lavrov was. "We never comment on the content of negotiations."

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Moscow dismisses reports Trump revealed secret information to Russia as political pressure

Earlier, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the media that Lavrov briefed President Vladimir Putin on his meeting with Trump in the usual way. "He (the foreign minister) always informs the president about his contacts (with foreign leaders)," Peskov said.

The theme of the meeting of one week ago has been raised by The Washington Post this week. The daily said that Trump might have shared with Lavrov and Russia’s ambassador in Washington Sergey Kislyak some absolutely secret information about the terrorist group Islamic State (outlawed in Russia). The New York Times later quoted current and former US officials as saying that the shared classified information had been obtained from Israel.

Peskov dismissed the publications as "utter nonsense" and "no subject for confirmation or denial." Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said such media reports were a continuation of the campaign that had been launched in the United States before the presidential election "for putting political pressures on the new administration in the White House, for bargaining over personnel appointments and for lobbying."

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