OREANDA-NEWS. June 24, 2010. At the French side’s invitation, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov attended a meeting of the Weimar Triangle Foreign Ministers – Guido Westerwelle of Germany, Bernard Kouchner of France and Radoslaw Sikorski of Poland – in Paris on June 23.

The meeting discussed the most topical issues on the European agenda, including the Russian initiative for a European Security Treaty. It backed up the proposal of President Dmitry Medvedev and Chancellor Angela Merkel to set up a Joint Russia-EU Committee on Security and Foreign Policy. Taking into account the results of the Russia-EU summit in Rostov-on-Don, the meeting underlined the necessity to ensure practical advance in the implementation of the Modernization Partnership and to strengthen the base of cooperation in crisis management.

Problems on the path leading to a visa-free regime for citizens of Russia and the EU countries were substantively examined. As an immediate objective the German and French ministers supported Lavrov and Sikorski’s letter to the European Commission asking for visa-free travel between Russia’s Kaliningrad Region and Poland’s adjacent areas.

An exchange of views took place on the situation in Afghanistan and on the coordination of humanitarian aid to the victims of the events in Kyrgyzstan.

The meeting also examined questions of the activity of the OSCE and the Russia-NATO Council in the context of the upcoming events to be held under their auspices.

The participants gave a positive appraisal of the meeting outcome, and agreed to continue contacts in this format.