PRESS RELEASE

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U.S. Secretary of State To Visit Moscow Shortly

April 5, 2017 (EIRNS)—Speaking to journalists in a telephone briefing, a high-ranking State Department official said U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson will visit Russia in the coming few weeks. Russian sources report he will be in Moscow on April 11-12.

The U.S. official said:

"In terms of Syria, again, you know, Russia and Iran signed up, and they claim themselves to be the guarantors of a cease-fire arrangement and that’s something that clearly, they are not able to deliver on or unwilling to deliver on. And so, that’s a very significant problem."

"Obviously, that’ll be something that we’ll be looking at and discussing and reviewing and the secretary will be in Moscow here in a couple of weeks,"

he said.

On the Astana Syrian cease-fire process that involves Russia, Turkey and Iran as guarantors the official said,

"You know, frankly, the U.S. doesn’t have that much influence over the actors on the ground that are party to the cease-fire. The outside backers that do have quite a bit of influence, Turkey, Iran, and Russia, are the primary self-proclaimed guarantors of that process. It’s a process we very much support."