Top U.S., Russia officials meet to discuss Minsk deal near Kaliningrad:
Assistant U.S. Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and Kremlin aide Vladislav Surkov have met to discuss the Ukraine crisis near Russia's western exclave of Kaliningrad.
A Russian Foreign Ministry representative said the meeting was held behind closed doors on January 15 at a state residence in the town of Pionersky, outside Kaliningrad, which borders EU members Lithuania and Poland.
U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said Nuland and Surkov met to discuss "the need for the full implementation of the Minsk agreements," a package of measures signed in February 2015 to resolve the war between Kyiv's forces and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.
"Assistant Secretary Nuland's meeting with presidential adviser Surkov is part of our continued efforts to work with Russia to ensure full implementation of the Minsk agreements, in close coordination with the other Normandy powers -- Ukraine, Germany, and France," Kirby said in a January 15 statement.
AFP quoted an unidentified source familiar with the matter as saying that the meeting was held on Russian territory because Surkov was slapped with Western sanctions in response to the Kremlin's interference in Ukraine. (AFP, TASS)