US rejects resuming flights to Russia amid Ukraine tensions
The United States has rejected Russia's proposal to resume direct flights between the two countries, according to Yuri Ushakov, an advisor to the President of Russia. This information was reported by both state-controlled and independent media sources.
The United States did not agree to resume direct flights with Russia, which were suspended in February 2022 after the Kremlin launched a full-scale war in Ukraine. This topic, however, surfaced in bilateral talks following a change in the U.S. administration.
Resuming flights to Russia: USA says "no"
As reported by moscowtimes.com on Thursday, citing Ushakov's remarks on the state-controlled television channel Rossiya 1, the USA has refused to resume flights to Russia. He explained that such a decision depends on progress regarding a ceasefire in Ukraine.
Putin's advisor expressed that, in the view of the Americans, progress on the Ukraine matter remains a prerequisite before any talks on air travel can begin. Nonetheless, he personally considers moving forward with such discussions to be a perfectly reasonable step, according to moscowtimes.com.
Despite negotiation attempts, no agreement was reached between Russia and the USA on this matter. In April, Kirill Dmitriev, head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund, traveled to Washington to continue talks with the new U.S. administration. The Russian side brought up the resumption of flights as well as the return of seized Russian properties in the USA.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio stated that there are no plans to resume flights. It remains unclear what arrangements, if any, were made regarding the seized buildings of the Russian Federation by Americans.
It should be emphasized that since these discussions between Washington and Moscow, Russians brutally attacked a playground in the Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih, killing 19 people, including nine children. They then carried out another shocking missile strike on the city of Sumy. In the latest attack, over 30 people were killed, yet Donald Trump remarked in the heat of the moment that he was "told the Russians made a mistake."
