MOSCOW, April 23. /TASS/. There are no plans to organize a meeting between top Russian and US diplomats, Sergey Lavrov and Antony Blinken, on the sidelines of the United Nations Security Council events, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said on Sunday.
"There are no such plans. As a matter of fact, we have no agenda to be discussed by the ministers at this point," he said ahead of the Russian delegation’s departure for New York.
Russia holds the presidency in the UN Security Council in April. As part of Russia’s presidency, Lavrov will take part in the UN Security Council meetings on April 24 and 25.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Panikin said earlier that Lavrov had invited top diplomats from a number of countries, including Blinken, to take part in UNSC ministerial meetings.
Meanwhile, Ryabkov said that he is not sure that Blinken would be at the UN headquarters on these days. "If he is there, we will decide depending on the situation. If not - I repeat - we will find way to convey the signals linked with this absolutely unacceptable, outrageous manifestation of the anti-Russian course," he explained. "And we will respond. I stress it once again," he added.
Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said earlier on Sunday that no American visas had been issued to Russian journalists. On her Telegram channel, she cited the US embassy as saying that they were "working on this." She slammed this situation as a "manipulation of the freedom of speech and infringement on the rights of journalists.".