U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Meets with Senior Officials in Moscow

The U.S. State Department announced that Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland will meet with senior Russian officials in Moscow on October 11. According to a statement from the press office of the State Department, "Nuland will travel to Moscow on October 11 to meet with senior officials and discuss a range of bilateral, regional, and international issues." It is noteworthy that Russian-Western relations have deteriorated due to the Ukraine crisis and the annexation of Crimea by Russia in March 2014. This crisis in relations between Russia and the West is considered the worst since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War more than 20 years ago. Ukraine and Western countries have consistently accused Russia of intervening in the conflict in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, while Moscow has repeatedly stated that it is not a party to the internal Ukrainian conflict.