Russia lauds 'constructive' Putin, Johnson meeting

The meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson on the sidelines of the Berlin Conference on Libya was "brief but constructive", a Russian official said on Tuesday.

The character of the contacts was different from what the U.K. premier office announced following the meeting, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters in the capital Moscow.

"In general, the contact was brief, but at the same time, let's say, quite constructive, with elements of a conciliatory attitude. Apparently, the spirit of the contact is clearly different from the crux of the Downing Street message," he said.

Commenting on the Putin-Johnson meeting in Berlin, the Downing Street had said U.K. prime minister "was clear there had been no change in the UK’s position on Salisbury", which he characterized as "a reckless use of chemical weapons and a brazen attempt to murder innocent people on UK soil" and warned against repeating such an attack.

"The Prime Minister said that they both had a responsibility to address issues of international security including Libya, Syria, Iraq and Iran. The Prime Minister said there will be no normalisation of our bilateral relationship until Russia ends the destabilising activity that threatens the UK and our allies and undermines the safety of our citizens and our collective security," the statement had said.

In March 2018, former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter were poisoned in the southern city of Salisbury in the U.K. with a chemical nerve agent.

Both eventually recovered and were discharged from the hospital and have since gone into hiding. London blamed Moscow for the chemical attack which had triggered global condemnation.