At a recent meeting of Russia’s Security Council - where President Vladimir Putin tasked top officials with preparing proposals for possible nuclear weapons tests—one development caught the eye of political analysts.
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, long seen as one of the most influential figures in Putin’s inner circle, was conspicuously absent from the gathering of permanent Security Council members, Sky News reported.
The fact that the country’s top diplomat skipped such a pivotal session was itself a signal that something inside the Kremlin’s hierarchy may have gone awry. Russia’s Kommersant, however, reported that the absence was “coordinated” rather than accidental.
Adding to the intrigue, the Kremlin plans to send a younger official—not Lavrov—to the upcoming G20 summit, a move that, for a man who represented Russia at the highest levels for years, could amount to a symbolic demotion.
What might have driven a rift among the Kremlin’s old guard? Western outlets, including the Financial Times, say Lavrov’s hard line in a conversation with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio prompted the cancellation of a planned Budapest summit between Presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. In effect, the minister’s stance scuttled a key diplomatic meeting—something seen as a major setback for the Kremlin.
“Lavrov either made a mistake or went off script. Accidentally or deliberately, his diplomacy - or lack of it - derailed the summit and apparently slowed a U.S.–Russia rapprochement,” Sky News noted.
The episode created the impression that Putin couldn’t fully control his own foreign minister - an outcome the Russian leader views as unacceptable. For a president who prizes absolute loyalty, it was a personal blow to his authority, portraying him as weakened and dependent on his entourage.
If rumors of Lavrov’s effective sidelining are confirmed, it would mark a turning point: the end of an era that has defined Russia’s foreign policy since the early 2000s.
On October 21, it emerged that U.S. President Donald Trump no longer plans to meet Putin in Hungary. The summit was canceled after the Kremlin called off a preparatory one-on-one between Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
