Delegates from the US and Russia will meet in Istanbul on Thursday as part of continued efforts to normalize embassy operations between the two countries, the US State Department has said. The talks, which will take place at the Russian consulate in Turkey's capital, will not include any discussion of political or security issues, the US said. "Ukraine is not, absolutely not, on the agenda," State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said. The Russian delegation will be led by the newly appointed ambassador to the US, Alexander Darchiev, and the US team by Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Sonata Coulter, the Russian Foreign Ministry said. Speaking at a daily press briefing on Tuesday, Bruce said the negotiations would focus "solely" on the functioning of the respective embassies, "not on normalizing a bilateral relationship overall". That "can only happen, as we've noted, once there is peace between Russia and Ukraine," he said. Earlier talks in February focused predominantly on conditions for each country's diplomats. Russia's Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova also said the second round of normalization talks would take place "in the coming days". Over the past decade, Washington and Moscow have expelled numerous diplomats and restricted the appointment of new officials. Diplomatic ties were then all but severed after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. However there has been a thaw in relations under the Trump administration. In February US and Russian officials met in Saudi Arabia for their first face-to-face talks since the invasion to discuss how to end the war in Ukraine. — BBC
