You're reading: Russian Foreign Ministry does not rule out possible meeting with Ukrainian diplomats ahead of April 4 session

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Vasily Nebenzya has not ruled out possible contacts with Ukrainian diplomats in the run-up to an April 4 session of the CIS Foreign Ministers' Council.

“A regular session of the CIS Foreign Ministers’ Council will be held
in Moscow on April 4. I do not rule out that in some form we may meet
with our CIS partners prior to that [the session], including
Ukrainians,” Nebenzya told reporters on Thursday.

Ukrainian partners’ proposal to hold an emergency session of the CIS
Foreign Ministers’ Council in Kyiv on March 7 is unfeasible, the deputy
foreign minister said.

“It is technically impossible for all of us to meet up tomorrow
because our foreign minister and other CIS ministers have prior
engagements that make this date unfeasible. But we are not rejecting
this dialogue,” he said.

Ukraine has not refused to hold the CIS chairmanship either, Nebenzya
said, referring to Ukrainian Ambassador to Russia Volodymyr Yelchenko.

“We have already discussed Ukraine’s chairmanship of the CIS. It has
not rejected it, and has confirmed that it will hold this post,”
Nebenzya said.

The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry’s Information Policy Department said
earlier that Ukraine had proposed holding an emergency session of the
CIS Foreign Ministers’ Council in Kyiv in order to discuss the situation
in the capital and the rest of the country.