Russia to send new ambassador to Washington in sign of progress with US

(Reuters) - Russia said on Friday it was sending a new ambassador to Washington, the latest sign of a thaw between the two countries as they try to mend their damaged relations and seek an end to the war in Ukraine.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said the U.S. side had given the green light for Alexander Darchiyev's appointment at a meeting in Turkey on Thursday.

Earlier, both sides said they agreed at the talks in Istanbul on steps to address disputes affecting the work of their embassies and consulates. Russia also said it had suggested restoring direct air links, which have been severed since the start of the war.

Darchiyev is a career diplomat who has served two long spells in Russia's Washington embassy and was ambassador to Canada from 2014 to 2021.

John J. Sullivan, a former U.S. ambassador to Russia, said in his memoir "Midnight in Moscow" that Darchiyev once got very angry with him over remarks by then-U.S. President Joe Biden, who called President Vladimir Putin a war criminal in 2022.

"As I was speaking, Darchiyev's face turned bright red. While he let me speak, he was visibly enraged. When I finished, he started screaming at me in a profane tirade that I should not come into the ministry with such a belligerent attitude," Sullivan wrote.

Sullivan, who declined further comment on the events when contacted by Reuters, said his U.S. colleagues from the embassy thought that as Darchiyev rose from his chair "he was going to take a swing at me".

Reuters has requested comment from Darchiyev via Russia's Foreign Ministry to get his side of the story.

The diplomat, currently head of the Foreign Ministry's North America Department, will leave for Washington soon, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. Moscow has not had an envoy in the U.S. since the last ambassador left his post in October.

(Reporting by Mark Trevelyan and Lucy Papachristou in London; editing by Aidan Lewis)