Russia and the United States are in the process of coordinating the next round of bilateral talks, Russia's RIA state news agency reported on Wednesday, citing the Russian foreign ministry's spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, as saying, amid ongoing tensions over the conflict in Ukraine.
However, prospects for diplomatic progress remain uncertain as Zakharova told RIA that Kiev and its allies reject the possibility of compromise on settling the conflict in Ukraine.
Russia launches air attack on Kiev
Meanwhile, Ukraine's air defence units were engaged in repelling a Russian air attack on Kiev, the city's military administration said on Wednesday, as nationwide air raid alerts followed warnings from Ukraine's air force of missile and drone strikes.
"Air defence is operating in Kiev! Stay in shelters until the all-clear is given!" Timur Tkachenko, head of Kiev's military administration, said on the Telegram messaging app.
Russia links future Ukraine talks to recognition of territorial gains
Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Moscow expects talks between Russia and Ukraine to continue but "new territorial realities" must be recognised and new systems of security guarantees formed.
"For peace to be durable, the new territorial realities ... must be recognised and formalised in international legal terms," Lavrov said in an interview to Indonesian Kompas newspaper, according to a transcript provided on the website of Russia's foreign ministry.
"A new system of security guarantees for Russia and Ukraine must be formed as an integral element of a pan-continental architecture of equal and indivisible security in Eurasia."
In an indirect reference to Moscow's continued opposition to Ukraine joining NATO, Lavrov said that "Ukraine should be guaranteed a neutral, non-aligned, and non-nuclear status."
Ukraine says it is not for Russia to decide what Kiev can or cannot join, while NATO says that Russia can have no veto over membership of the alliance which was formed in 1949 to counter the threat from the Soviet Union.
US President Donald Trump, who held a summit with Putin in Alaska in mid-August and subsequently met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and key European and NATO alliance leaders at the White House in efforts to bring an end to the war, said on Tuesday he was "very disappointed" in the Russian leader.
Trump had expected Zelenskyy and Putin to meet after the summit.
Zelenskyy has said Russia is doing everything it can to prevent the meeting, while Russia says the agenda for such a meeting is not ready.
Lavrov said the heads of the Russian and Ukrainian delegations were in direct contact.
