MOSCOW, February 9. /TASS/. Russia has submitted proposals to the American authorities for the resumption of direct air traffic, head of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Department of the North Atlantic Alexander Gusarov said, adding that the ball is in their court.

Moscow believes it is right to move from the simple to the complex, decisively removing the most serious barriers to improving relations between Russia and the United States, he told the Kommersant newspaper. "This primarily concerns Washington's ‘old debt’ to return Russian diplomatic property in the United States confiscated under previous administrations. The resumption of direct air travel between our countries could provide impetus for relaunching humanitarian, trade, and investment ties, primarily to the benefit of the United States itself. Our proposals on these matters have been submitted to the American authorities, the ball is in their court," he said.

The dialogue is conducted alternately in Moscow and Washington at a working level corresponding to the scale of the topics being discussed, Gusarov noted.

"If necessary, if we sense a willingness on the part of our American colleagues to engage in a more serious discussion on the issues identified, we will be prepared to calibrate the negotiation format. Let me repeat that without progress on issues that are prior for us, it is difficult for us to imagine a full-fledged normalization of interstate cooperation between Russia and the United States, which would open up broad prospects for both countries in the areas of trade, high technology, joint extraction of natural resources, cooperation in the Arctic and space," he said.