
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stressed on Friday that Moscow is ready to help mediate any talks on the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian Authority (PA) conflict if both sides are willing to compromise, the Sputnik news agency reported.
"We support anything which brings us closer to the resumption of Israeli-Palestinian talks. For this to happen, any initiative must be acceptable to both, and when it is acceptable to both parties, they must agree on what will be the added value," Lavrov was quoted as having said at a press conference following his address to the UN General Assembly.
"So far, it doesn't seem that the parties are equally eager to consider it,” he added, “but we are working with both Israel and [the PA].
“We have to resume negotiations anyway, and there might be some meetings between Israeli Prime Minister [Binyamin] Netanyahu and [PA chairman Mahmoud] Abbas that might be helpful," Lavrov continued.
Russian President Vladimir Putin recently expressed his willingness to host Netanyahu and Abbas for a meeting to resume peace talks that have been stalled since 2014.
Russia's Foreign Ministry later said that Netanyahu and Abbas had agreed in principle to such a meeting but stressed that no date had been set for one.
Recent reports indicated Israel had actually agreed to a three-way peace summit with the United States and the PA, but the PA preconditioned such a summit taking place on Israel ceasing construction in Judea and Samaria and releasing additional terrorist prisoners.
The PA chairman has also insisted that any reboot of peace talks with Israel should happen within a clear timeframe and under international supervision.