MOSCOW - Moscow called on Sunday for a new "reset 2.0" in relations with Washington, saying the situation in Ukraine that had led to Western sanctions against Russia was improving thanks to Kremlin peace initiatives. Washington and Brussels accuse Moscow of supporting a pro-Russian rebellion in eastern Ukraine. The conflict has brought relations between Moscow and the West to their lowest level since the end of the Cold War.
In a television interview, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said it was time to repeat the "reset," Washington's name for an attempt to improve ties early in Obama's presidency. "We are absolutely interested in bringing the ties to normal but it was not us who destroyed them. Now they require what the Americans would probably call a 'reset'," Lavrov said, according to a transcript of the interview on his ministry's website. "The current U.S. administration is destroying today much of the cooperation structure that it created itself along with us. Most likely, something more will come up - a reset No. 2 or a reset 2.0," he said. Shortly after Obama took office, then Secretary of State Hilary Clinton gave Lavrov a red "reset" button intended to signal a fresh start to relations - but the button accidentally bore a Russian label that said "overload" instead of "reset."
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