Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken held a phone conversation on Saturday to discuss the situation in Ukraine and security guarantees between Russia and the West.

According to a statement from the Russian Foreign Ministry, Lavrov stressed that the propaganda campaign launched by the United States and its allies about "Russian aggression" against Ukraine pursues provocative goals, encouraging the authorities in Kiev to sabotage the Minsk agreements and to make harmful attempts to resolve the "Donbas issue" by force.

As for Moscow's draft agreement with NATO and draft treaty with the United States on security guarantees, Lavrov pointed out that the response of Washington and Brussels "ignores key provisions for Moscow," primarily on the non-expansion of the alliance and the non-deployment of strike weapons systems near Russian borders.

These issues, he added, will be at the center of Moscow's assessment of the documents received from the United States and NATO.

Lavrov told Blinken that any actions violating the commitments made at the highest level on indivisible security in the Euro-Atlantic region are unacceptable.

The two sides also touched upon some topical issues of bilateral relations.

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