WASHINGTON, March 27. /TASS/. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that the United States and Russia reached an agreement in principle on a Black Sea ceasefire during talks in Saudi Arabia.
"What we have here is an agreement in principle on a Black Sea ceasefire," he said at a joint press conference with Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness in Kingston. "After our meeting, as part of their release, the Russians detailed a number of conditions that they want to see met in order to do that. So we're going to evaluate that," he noted.
"So we're going to be gathering and sort of when our folks get back, sitting down, going through the proposals, getting their impressions of the conversations, so we can more fully understand what the Russian position is, or what their ask is in exchange, and then we'll present that to the president, who will ultimately make a decision about what the next step here," Rubio pointed out.
The Kremlin on Tuesday released a statement following the March 24 expert consultations with Washignton. According to the document, Russia and the US agreed to continue working towards achieving a durable and lasting peace. In particular, the parties agreed to ensure safe navigation in the Black Sea. They also agreed to develop measures for implementing agreements to ban strikes against energy facilities in Russia and Ukraine for a period of 30 days starting on March 18. The Russia-US agreements on the Black Sea will take effect once sanctions on Rosselkhozbank (Russian Agricultural Bank) and other financial institutions involved in agricultural exports are lifted. There are also a number of other conditions.