Wadephul meets Lavrov at UN, calls Russia to de-escalate

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NEW YORK — German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul held a surprise meeting with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov at the U.N. on Saturday, just one day after he welcomed the U.S. invite for Russian President Vladimir Putin to the G20 summit.

“Wadephul called on the Russian Federation to abandon its dangerous path of escalation toward Germany, Europe, and NATO,” a German official said after the meeting, which lasted about 30 minutes. The official was granted anonymity to discuss the meeting.

The minister also “condemned Russia’s ongoing and increasingly targeted aggression against the Ukrainian civilian population” and highlighted that, “every month, tens of thousands of Russian soldiers die in a hopeless war of attrition, while the Russian economy continues to collapse,” the official said.

The meeting of the German and the Russian ministers — the first of that kind since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 — comes amid high tensions between Berlin and Moscow.

Earlier this month, the German government accused Russian intelligence services of having orchestrated the attempted drone attack on a Ukrainian cargo plane at the Leipzig airport in Eastern Germany. In reaction, Germany imposed sanctions, including the closure of Russia’s consulate in Bonn, to which Moscow responded with similar measures against Germany, notably the closure of Germany’s consulate in St. Petersburg.

Germany and Russia also clashed during a U.N. Security Council meeting earlier this week, during which Wadephul slammed “Russia’s reckless and dangerous escalation in Europe,” while Lavrov accused Europe of “criminal methods.”

The German official said that Wadephul “made clear” during Saturday’s meeting “that incidents such as the recent attempted attack in Leipzig or other hybrid attacks would not shake Germany’s determination to support Ukraine, which is under attack. However, they would further damage bilateral relations with Germany, which have already been severely strained by Russia.”

The Russian side did not immediately provide a detailed readout of Saturday’s meeting. Moscow’s foreign ministry spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, instead referred to a polemic Russian report that calls into question the authenticity of the Bucha massacre, and that appears to have been put on the table during the ministers’ meeting.

The meeting was also immediately overshadowed by different explanations over who had requested it.

Zakharova claimed that Wadephul had asked to meet Lavrov. Yet Wadephul told German public television ZDF that he had agreed to meet Lavrov after the Russian foreign minister, through third-party intermediaries, signaled a willingness to engage in talks.

The reunion of Wadephul and Lavrov was held against the backdrop of renewed efforts by the U.S. and its Western allies to jumpstart peace talks between Russia and Ukraine. Earlier this week, the U.S. government issued an invitation to Putin for the G20 summit in Miami in December, raising the possibility of potential negotiations between the Russian president and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Florida.

While some other European leaders criticized that invitation, Wadephul said he welcomed the initiative , calling it “a litmus test for Putin.”

“Opportunities like this must be seized,” Wadephul said on Friday.

Wadephul had added a caveat, however, saying that, “in my view, a ceasefire is also necessary in order to be able to negotiate in earnest.”