GENEVA, January 21. /TASS/. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he is satisfied with the exchange of views with Russia at a meeting on security guarantees in Geneva, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told a news conference after talks with Blinken.

The Russian top diplomat noted that today’s meeting was intermediate. "Antony Blinken said he is satisfied with the exchange of views, which will help them next week - it has been stressed several times - to issue a written response," Lavrov said.

"Today, we heard a certain repetition of arguments about the freedom of choice, freedom of choosing alliances, military alliances, but we cited a range of documents where this freedom of the choice of alliances stems from the necessity to avoid some steps that would strengthen the security of one state to the prejudice of the security of other states," he noted. "We asked Anthony Blinken and his team to explain to us how they interpret this part of those commitments which were adopted at the political level in the OSCE and were repeatedly confirmed there."

On December 17, 2021, the Russian Foreign Ministry published the draft agreements between Moscow and Washington on security guarantees and measures for ensuring the security of Russia and NATO member states.

Russian-US and Russian-NATO talks on security guarantees were held last week. On January 10, Geneva hosted Russia-US consultations on these matters. On January 12, a Russia-NATO Council meeting was held in Brussels, and a meeting of the OSCE Permanent Council was held in Vienna on the following day.