In July 2016, Obama ordered dozens of USA troops to the country to protect the US embassy there; and a few days later, the US evacuated all non-emergency staff from the embassy.
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a joint news conference with Italian President Sergio Mattarella after their talks at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia April 11, 2017.
The message from Moscow was that Putin hasn't yet given up hope that President Donald Trump wants to make good on his campaign promises for better relations even after Trump ordered Tomahawk missiles to hit a Syrian airbase in response to a chemical-weapons attack the USA blames on President Bashar al-Assad, Putin's ally.
In the interview, Assad insisted it was "not clear" whether an attack on Khan Sheikhun had even happened.
But Lavrov, on Thursday, offered a speck of optimism for the future of the relationship between the two Cold War foes.
Russia's hopes for a thaw in Russia-US ties following Mr Trump's election have been shattered by the congressional investigation into alleged ties between Trump campaign associates and Russia.
Lavrov blamed the poor relations on the previous administration and a U.S. "fixation" on removing dictators around the world, a reference to USA demands that Russian Federation abandon its ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Lavrov said the Russians want Syria's government to be "democratic" and "secular".
- President Donald Trump switched his rhetoric about Russia Wednesday, in stark contrast to his campaign trail praise of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Tillerson conceded the two world powers had "sharp differences" that have obstructed cooperation but voiced optimism that their talks could narrow those differences.
The two also announced new measures meant to prevent things from getting worse: Moscow and Washington will set up a working group created to improve their relationship, Lavrov said, and Putin has agreed to restore a bilateral U.S. -Russia safety agreement over Syrian skies, which Moscow announced it had suspended in the wake of the missile strike. "Tillerson had serious dialogue in Moscow that can help start dealing with issues". Russian President Vladimir Putin denounced the strike as "act of aggression" and said it violated global law.
Canada bills will legalise marijuana
Adults would be able to have up to 30 grams of legal marijuana in public and be permitted to grow up to four plants per household. The news that Canada was soon going to announce the law was noticed online last month by Snoop Dogg, who tweeted "Oh Canada!"
Lavrov endorsed a shared U.S. -Russia ambition to defeat ISIS, saying the Trump administration and Russian Federation "agreed to continue to work bilaterally in order to facilitate this process".
Syria dominated the agenda on Wednesday.
Mr. Peskov's ambiguous remarks about supporting Assad came a couple of days before it became known that the group of USA senators have proposed a bill for worldwide investigation into alleged war crimes by the Syrian authorities. But Tillerson repeated the administration's new belief that "the reign of the Assad family is coming to an end".
"If we could move towards an after-Assad regime in Syria which guaranteed the non-intervention of Islamic fundamentalism, [Russia] would be delighted to work in that direction".
There was no indication that the two sides changed their positions on the issue of Syria, which triggered a spate of mutual rebukes in the run-up to - and during - Tillerson's visit.
Pressure on Russia: China's break, taken with continued denunciations by the US and its Western allies of Russian support of Assad, could raise the stakes for Russia.
Tillerson said both nations would set up a "working group" to seek ways to ease tensions. Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for Mr. Putin, however, suggested that "unconditional support is not possible in this current world", apparently referring to Russia's support for Assad. But so far, it appears the two countries are growing further apart.
Despite the high stakes and heightened scrutiny, there were some aspects of Wednesday's visit that seemed nearly playful.
The first time a UNSC resolution on the Syrian civil war failed to pass came six months after the beginning of the bloody conflict. Still, he held out hope that the United States and Russian Federation could come to terms, suggesting that Tillerson's talks with Putin had gone better than expected.
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