A Kiev official fumed over American “imperialism” after a controversial NBC report. A senior Ukrainian Foreign Ministry official was incensed by the NBC report claiming secret peace discussions involving former US officials.
Americans who reportedly discussed peace in Ukraine behind Kiev’s back are traitors and imperialists, an ambassador at the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry has said in response to a news story claiming that such talks took place.
“So, a group of anonymous US tankies discussing Ukraine with Russia behind Ukraine’s back? There’re [sic] another words to describe it: treason, betrayal, and pure imperialism,” tweeted Alexander Scherba, Kiev’s “ambassador for strategic communications” and a former envoy to Austria.
He was reacting to a NBC News report, based entirely on anonymous sources, which claimed that a group of former US national security officials have been conducting “track two” talks with “prominent Russians believed to be close to the Kremlin” for the past several months.
US President Joe Biden’s administration found issues with the NBC story, disavowing any role in the alleged talks. Washington “did not sanction those discussions,” a State Department spokesman said in a statement on Thursday.
Meanwhile, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told CBS News that, while the White House was “aware” of the unofficial contacts, “I want to make it clear that these discussions were not encouraged or engendered by us and we were not supporting them in any active way.”
Richard Haass, the former head of the Council on Foreign Relations who was reportedly involved in the talks, mentioned the NBC report in a Substack post on Friday, seeking to address “some legitimate interest in my position mixed in with nasty, ad hominem attacks.”
Haass said he was “present” at the meeting between “several former senior US national security officials and a group of Russian diplomats led by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov” that allegedly took place in April. No such meeting was acknowledged on Lavrov’s agenda during his visit to New York to chair the UN Security Council.
Moscow has described the NBC News report as “fake” and “disinformation,” without going into any details.
Russia has long said it has nothing to negotiate with the Ukrainian leadership, and will only deal with those in the West who are pulling its strings.
The US has said that it will never discuss Ukraine without the direct involvement of Ukrainians. Kiev, meanwhile, insists that the only framework for ending the conflict is President Vladimir Zelensky’s “peace formula,” which would amount to Russian capitulation and has been rejected by Moscow as delusional.
FILE PHOTO: Council on Foreign Relations President Richard Haass © AP / Seth Wenig