Putin meets Kerry in Moscow to discuss Ukrainian, Syrian conflicts

Russian President Vladimir Putin and US Secretary of State John Kerry will meet on Thursday in Moscow to discuss the conflicts in Ukraine and Syria.

In what is Kerry’s fourth visit to Russia in just one year, he will meet Putin in the presence of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who will hold talks with Kerry again on Friday morning.

The visit comes just days after the NATO summit in Warsaw, in which alliance leaders decided to strengthen military presence on European borders with Russia, through the deployment of 4,000 soldiers in Poland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

Putin is expected to tell Kerry about Russia’s concerns over the military activity by the United States and its allies in eastern Europe and reiterate his opposition to the deployment of antimissile shields.

The Kremlin chief considers that this deployment causes a power imbalance between Russia and the West and seriously threatens security throughout the European continent.

As for the conflict in Syria, the Russian president will insist that the United States should influence their allies of the Syrian moderate opposition to withdraw from positions where they share control with terrorist groups.

Putin and Kerry will also discuss the implementation of the Minsk agreements for peace in Ukraine, although both sides’ positions are quite different in this regard.