US, Russia trade blame as diplomats fail to meet in Africa
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — They could have run into each other sipping coffee in the lobby, perhaps at the bar at Ethiopia’s finest hotel. But U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov don’t plan to meet, and now both countries are trading accusations about who’s to blame.
The top American and Russian diplomats warily circled each other in Africa, where both are paying official visits this week. As their two countries trade accusations over Syria, Ukraine and even the Oscars, their governments are trolling each other with barbs on social media.
Russia said that both Tillerson and Lavrov were staying at the lush Sheraton Addis resort while in Ethiopia, where Tillerson met Thursday with the country’s outgoing prime minister and with the African Union Commission’s chairman.
It was unclear how long the two were overlapping in the Ethiopian capital. Tillerson arrived Wednesday and planned to leave early Friday for Djibouti. Lavrov, speaking Thursday in Zimbabwe, said he would be in Addis Ababa “this evening,” but didn’t specify the time.