On June 30, William Burns called Sergey Naryshkin to assure the Kremlin that the US had had no role in the mutiny of Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin
Sergei Naryshkin and William Burns
(Portal) Russia’s foreign intelligence chief Sergei Naryshkin said on Wednesday that he and fellow CIA officer William Burns spoke in a phone call late last month about “what to do with Ukraine,” Russia’s TASS news agency reported.
The New York Times and Wall Street Journal reported on June 30 that Burns called Naryshkin to reassure the Kremlin that the United States was not involved in a brief mutiny a week earlier between Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin and his fighter Wagner had.
Naryshkin confirmed that Burns brought up “the events of June 24,” when mercenaries took control of a southern Russian town and advanced toward Moscow before reaching an agreement with the Kremlin to end the uprising. But he said that during most of the call, which lasted about an hour, we “considered and discussed what we should do in relation to Ukraine.”
No comment was initially available from the CIA.
Ukraine, which was invaded by Russia in February 2022, says other countries should not negotiate its future on its behalf, and the United States has repeatedly backed this tenet, described as “nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine.” .
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Burns and Naryshkin have maintained a line of communication since the outbreak of war in Ukraine, at a time when other direct contacts between Moscow and Washington are minimal and relations are at their lowest point since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
Naryshkin told TASS that talks of war would eventually be possible. The agency didn’t specify if that was part of their conversation with Burns. “It is natural that negotiations are possible sooner or later, because every conflict, including an armed conflict, ends in negotiations, but the conditions for this have yet to be matured,” he said, according to TASS.
Asked about the report, Ukraine’s presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak told Portal: “Today, someone like Naryshkin has no influence on how this war will end.” Podolyak said Russia was losing the war and there could be no negotiations with the likes of Naryshkin. “These Russian elite have a completely inadequate perception of events, so there is nothing to discuss with them.”
Ukraine, which launched a longawaited counteroffensive last month, has said it will not start talks at this time because it could effectively freeze the situation on the battlefield, where Russia has captured more than a sixth of its territory.