Pompeo Names Russian, US Overlapping Interests, Calls Sochi Talks 'Substantive'

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - US State Secretary Mike Pompeo said he had been able to successfully have substantive discussions with Russian President Vladimir Putin during their recent talks in the Russian resort city of Sochi.

"We went there for a very substantive set of conversations which we were able to successfully have," Pompeo said in an interview with Fox News Radio released late on Thursday.

Pompeo also said that US-Russian counterterrorism cooperation has helped to protect lives of Russian nationals and step up the United States' security.

"When I was a CIA director, we worked on counterterrorism all around the world passing information about terror threats between our two countries. I know for certain we kept America safe as a result of information that Russian provided us and I know we saved Russian lives with information that we had in our possession," Pompeo said in an interview with Fox News Radio released late on Thursday.

The top diplomat added that counterterrorism efforts and cooperation on settling the crisis in Afghanistan and the North Korea nuclear issue were "three examples of discrete places where it makes real sense for the United States and Russia to work together."

Pompeo also said that the reduction of violence in Afghanistan meets interests of both Russia and the United States, since both Washington and Moscow are concerned over terrorist threat coming from the Middle Eastern country.

"Today in Afghanistan we're working to try to achieve reconciliation there. Russia has been very close to Afghanistan and has a terrorist threat that can emulate from that region in the same way that the United States has a terror threat that may — there's an overlap. We could achieve a reduction in violence there. We could do good for each of our two countries," Pompeo said.

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US State Secretary also said that Russia and the United States had overlapping interests concerning North Korea, adding that Moscow, particularly, sought to ensure "there aren't loose nuclear materials floating around in the region."

"The Russians have an interest too in ensuring that there aren't loose nuclear materials floating around in the region. They share a border with the North Koreans. They have an interest in helping the North Korean economy be successful once it's denuclearized. So there are places there too where we not only can but have worked closely together," Pompeo said during the interview.

The negotiations between Pompeo and Putin took place on Tuesday.