WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken spoke on Friday to his Russian counterpart, Sergey V. Lavrov, and urged him to simply accept a proposal for the discharge of Brittney Griner and Paul N. Whelan, however reported no breakthrough.
Mr. Blinken instructed reporters at a information convention that he had spoken to his Russian counterpart by cellphone, their first dialog since weeks earlier than Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine. He declined to say how Mr. Lavrov responded.
“I urged International Minister Lavrov to maneuver ahead with that proposal,” he stated. “I’m not going to characterize his response, and I can’t provide you with an evaluation of whether or not I feel issues are any roughly probably.”
In its account of the decision, Russia’s International Ministry stated that when talking concerning the doable change of imprisoned residents, Mr. Lavrov prompt returning to a process of “quiet diplomacy,” with out “speculative info campaigns.”
Ms. Griner, a W.N.B.A. star who had been taking part in for a Russian workforce through the low season, is on trial in a Russian courtroom and faces a sentence of as much as 10 years in jail on drug prices. The 31-year-old athlete was detained in a Moscow airport a few week earlier than Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, after customs officers found cannabis oil in her baggage.
Mr. Whelan, a former Marine and company safety government, was detained in 2018 in a Moscow lodge, the place he had been staying for a pal’s marriage ceremony. In 2020, a Russian courtroom sentenced him to 16 years in jail for espionage, a cost that he and his household have denied.
The State Division has categorised each Mr. Whelan and Ms. Griner as “wrongfully detained.”
In keeping with an individual briefed on the matter, the Biden administration supplied final month to commerce the Russian arms vendor Viktor Bout, who’s presently serving a 25-year federal jail sentence in the US, for Ms. Griner and Mr. Whelan.
Mr. Blinken additionally stated he had pressed Mr. Lavrov to make good on a current Russian settlement to permit the passage of Ukrainian grain from Black Sea ports, and instructed him that the world would by no means settle for the additional Russian annexation of Ukrainian territory.
He warned Mr. Lavrov towards “sham referendums” meant to “falsely exhibit that the folks in these elements of Ukraine someway search to change into a part of Russia.”
Such actions, Mr. Blinken stated, “will lead to extra important prices being imposed upon Russia, if it follows by way of on this plan.”
Mr. Lavrov, in response to Russia’s International Ministry, stated that the grain state of affairs was “difficult by U.S. sanctions.” He additionally stated that Russian forces “strictly observe the norms of worldwide regulation.”
He added that Russia’s targets in Ukraine “will likely be totally fulfilled.”
