Russian intelligence chief Naryshkin talks about conversation with CIA head following Prigozhin mutiny

Sergey Naryshkin, head of the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), has told TASS that he spoke with CIA Director William Burns by phone in late June.

“The pretext for the phone conversation, as I understand it on the part of my American colleague, were the events of June 24,” Naryshkin said, without specifying which events he was referring to (the Prigozhin mutiny).

“It’s clear how I answered the question of what happened,” the SVR chief said, again without going into details.

However, according to Naryshkin, discussing “the events of June 24,” was only a pretext for the CIA chief. “Because the main part of the conversation was focused on discussing the topic and events around Ukraine. We thought about and speculated on what to do about Ukraine,” the SVR director said, noting that the conversation with Burns lasted “about an hour.”

Naryshkin, responding to a question from a TASS correspondent, said that he would not rule out further conversations with Burns by phone or a personal meeting with the CIA director, although, according to Naryshkin, there has been no mention of it yet.