Donald Trump’s administration understands need for caution in dealing with Vladimir Putin, says Boris Johnson
DONALD Trump’s new US administration understands the need for caution in dealing with Vladimir Putin, says Boris Johnson.
The Foreign Secretary’s comments come despite the President’s national security adviser General Mike Flynn resigning over his links to Russia this week.
After his first meeting with US secretary of state Rex Tillerson during the G20 summit in Bonn, Mr Johnson said they had agreed that dealings with the Kremlin had to be handled in a "very guarded way".
While neither the US nor the UK wanted to see a return to the days of the Cold War, he said they were clear Moscow should not be allowed to carry on with its current behaviour unchallenged.
"I think Rex Tillerson is absolutely clear in his view, which is the same as mine. You have got to engage with Russia but you have got to engage in a very guarded way," he told the BBC.
“You have got to beware of what they are up to.
"There is no question that, when you look at Russian activity on the cyber front, when you look at what they are doing in the western Balkans, when you at what has been happening in the Ukraine, you have got to be very, very cautious.
"I think it is entirely right to have a dual-track approach.
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"We don't want to get into a new Cold War. That's something London and Washington are completely at one on.
"But nor do we want Russian behaviour to continue as it is.
“Rex Tillerson has been very clear about that."
His comments come amid intense scrutiny in the US of the administration's attitude towards Russia following the resignation of Mr Flynn over his contacts with the Russian ambassador to US before Mr Trump's inauguration last month.
Mr Tillerson told his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov at the Swiss summit that Washington would cooperate with Moscow but only if it is in US interest to do so.
"The United States will consider working with Russia when we can find areas of practical cooperation that will benefit the American people," the former oil exec said in a statement.
He also urged Russia to meet its Minsk ceasefire commitments in Ukraine, where Russian intervention and its annexation of Crimea have plunged Western ties with Moscow into a deep freeze.
Meanwhile the US defence secretary General James Mattis, attending a meeting of Nato defence ministers in Brussels, brushed aside an offer by Mr Putin of co-operation with Western intelligence agencies to combat international terrorism.
He said the Kremlin had to show it was prepared to abide by international law and honour past agreements with Nato if there was to be any return to security co-operation which was broken off by the US following Moscow's annexation of Crimea in 2014.