Russia welcomes ‘constructive’ US position on North Korea dialogues

MOSCOW — Russia on Wednesday said it welcomed US Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson’s statement that Washington is ready for talks with North Korea without preconditions, calling this a constructive approach.

“We can state that such constructive statements impress us far more than the confrontational rhetoric that we have heard up to now. Undoubtedly this can be welcomed,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists.

Mr. Peskov said that Washington’s change of tone chimed with Russia’s repeated calls for Washington to cool down its response to North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.

“This goes in the same direction as the calls from Russia,” said Mr. Peskov, adding that President Vladimir Putin has regularly warned the US that “confrontational rhetoric and any steps that could provoke further tensions on the Korean peninsula are absolutely counterproductive.”

“It was Putin who regularly and consistently called for all the parties involved to do all they could to set up channels for dialogue. Therefore, such statements (as Tillerson’s) of course do give us satisfaction,” the Kremlin spokesman said.

Asked if the US was grabbing the initiative from Russia, Mr. Peskov said that calming the situation was a shared aim and “no one can grab anything from any one else. The main thing here is succeeding in the task.”

Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov said earlier Wednesday that Moscow did not need to put pressure on its Soviet-era ally and neighbor North Korea to participate in talks with Washington, since Pyongyang has said it is keen to do this.

“I don’t think we need to influence North Korea in this direction, because Pyongyang has many times at different levels declared its readiness (for talks),” Ryabkov told journalists, quoted by RIA Novosti state news agency.

“Let’s hope that after the statements coming from a high level in Washington, the opportunity for this will fall into place,” he said. —