Blinken: It’s ‘up to Russia to decide’ what relationship it will have with US

Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday said it was “up to Russia” whether or not it has a more stable relationship with the U.S. following a meeting last week with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

While appearing on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS,” Blinken said he and Lavrov had an “instructive, very business like conversation over the course of nearly two hours, but President Biden’s been very clear with President Putin. And I repeated what President Biden said to President Putin to Foreign Minister Lavrov, and that’s this, we would prefer to have a more stable, predictable relationship with Russia.”

Blinken said a more stable relationship between the U.S. and Russia would be beneficial for both countries and “good for the world.”

“And there are clearly areas where it’s in our mutual interest to find ways to cooperate, whether it’s on Afghanistan, whether it’s on so-called strategic stability or arms control agreements, whether it’s on dealing with climate change,” Blinken said.

He added, “It’s really important to be very clear about what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, and, ultimately, it is up to Russia to decide whether it wants to have that more predictable, stable relationship. We need to test the proposition.”

President Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin are expected to take part in a summit at a yet-to-be-named third-party country some time this summer.

Tensions with between Russia and the U.S. currently remain high due to actions such election interference, the SolarWinds hack and the recent military buildup at the Ukraine border.