Next round of US-Russia talks: Advisor to FSB Director to take part on Russia's side

Negotiations between representatives of Russia and the United States will take place in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on March 24, Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov said.

Photo: flickr.com by US State Department, https://creativecommons.org/public-domain/pdm/

US and Russia flags

"We agreed with Mr. [US National Security Advisor Mike] Waltz that consultations on this matter will be held in a bilateral format by experts appointed by the presidents. These consultations will take place on Monday, March 24, in Riyadh," he said, Kremlin.News Telegram channel reports.

According to him, the Russian delegation will include Senator Grigory Karasin and Sergey Beseda, an advisor to the director of the FSB.

Ushakov said that he regularly holds telephone conversations with White House National Security Advisor Mike Waltz. The talks will focus on an initiative "related to the security of shipping in the waters of the Black Sea," the presidential aide clarified.

Grigory Karasin, 75, joined the Federation Council as a representative of the Sakhalin region in 2019. Until 2021, he served as the first deputy chairman of the Federation Council's Committee on Science, Education, and Culture. He then became the head of the Committee on International Affairs. From 2005, and before joining the Federation Council, he was the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia, overseeing relations with CIS countries. He had been working in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs since the 1970s.

General Sergey Beseda, 70, headed the FSB's Fifth Service, which deals with operational information and international relations, since 2009. In February 2014, he was in Kyiv, overseeing the protection of the Russian embassy and other state institutions in the Ukrainian capital.

In March 2022, journalist and editor-in-chief of the Agentura.ru website (blocked in Russia) Andrei Soldatov (recognized as a foreign agent by the Ministry of Justice) reported that Beseda had been arrested in Russia. However, the Investigative Committee later denied RTVI's information about the initiation and investigation of criminal cases against the general.

In 2023, the head of Ukrainian military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, called Beseda a person "who always brought problems to Ukraine."

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Riyadh is the capital and largest city of Saudi Arabia. It is also the capital of the Riyadh Province and the centre of the Riyadh Governorate. Located on the eastern bank of Wadi Hanifa, the current form of the metropolis largely emerged in the 1950s as an offshoot of the 18th century walled town following the dismantling of its defensive fortifications. It is the largest city on the Arabian Peninsula, and is situated in the center of the an-Nafud desert, on the eastern part of the Najd plateau. The city sits at an average of 600 meters (2,000 ft) above sea level, and receives around 5 million tourists each year, making it the forty-ninth most visited city in the world and the 6th in the Middle East. Riyadh had a population of 7.0 million people in 2022, making it the most-populous city in Saudi Arabia, 3rd most populous in the Middle East, and the 38th most populous in Asia.