An NBC News report claiming that a group of former US officials have been in “secret talks” with Moscow is not accurate, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stated on Thursday.
“Fake [news]” and “disinformation spread by Western media,” Zakharova wrote on Telegram, next to a crossed-out bulletin summarizing the NBC story.
According to the US outlet, a group of former American national security officials have been conducting “track two” negotiations – with the White House’s knowledge but not on its instructions – with “prominent Russians believed to be close to the Kremlin” for the past several months.
Moreover, at least one former US official has traveled to Russia “for discussions involving the Ukraine war,” according to two of NBC’s sources. The network cited two current and four former US officials, all anonymously.
NBC named four of the Americans engaging in so-called 'secret diplomacy' as former Pentagon official Mary Beth Long and three Council of Foreign Relations (CFR) officials: Richard Haass, Charles Kupchan and Thomas Graham. The latter were said to have met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in New York “for several hours” back in April.