美国和俄罗斯官员周一举行了7个多小时的会谈，但双方没有进行谈判，也没有就俄罗斯将袭击邻国乌克兰的担忧加剧达成任何决议。

在会谈后的决斗新闻发布会上，美国和俄罗斯高级外交官表示，他们的会谈是建设性的，因为他们现在将于周三在北约总部进行第二轮会谈。

但是，尽管美国副国务卿温迪·谢尔曼敦促谨慎行事，并称赞这种“坦率和直率”的语气，但她的对手俄罗斯副外长谢尔盖·里亚布科夫警告说，美国行动太慢，没有认真对待莫斯科的关键要求。

这是否为真正的谈判创造了条件，或者俄罗斯领导人弗拉基米尔·普京是否在为战争寻找借口，仍不清楚，因为俄罗斯正在努力夺回其苏联的势力范围，并对欧洲安全提出30年来最明确、最根本的挑战。

里亚布科夫说，在美国给予乌克兰和格鲁吉亚永远不会加入北约的法律保证之前，不可能取得任何进展。

“我们受够了信口开河，半信半疑。乌克兰和格鲁吉亚永远不会成为北约成员，”里亚布科夫随后告诉记者，重申了俄罗斯上月在两项条约草案中提出的最高要求。“我们不信任对方。我们需要铁甲的、防水的、防弹的、有法律约束力的保证。不是保障，而是保证。”

他说，在俄罗斯的核心要求上“没有取得进展”，并警告说，美国没有认识到局势的紧迫性。

尽管他否认乌克兰边境三面的大约10万俄罗斯军队正在为入侵做准备，但里亚布科夫再次警告说，乌克兰可能会通过“挑衅”引发冲突

“适可而止。车站现在是如此危险和不稳定，我们不能承受任何进一步的延误，”他补充说。

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但谢尔曼明确表示，美国不会屈服于它认为的一个关键原则，即像乌克兰这样的国家可以自己决定加入联盟。相反，她说，美国就如何缓和紧张局势和提高世界两个最大核大国之间的透明度提出了“初步想法”，包括减少导弹部署或军事演习。

她对记者说:“我们当然敦促俄罗斯去规模化，创造一个有利于外交轨道的环境，但我们会看到的，

她说，尽管双方“对彼此以及彼此的优先事项和关切有了更好的理解”，但他们还没有参与谈判:“我们还没有准备好制定文本并开始来回走。”

“我们必须给予外交和对话在如此复杂的问题上取得进展所需的时间和空间，”她补充说，美国将“尽可能迅速地采取行动”，但“像军备控制这样复杂议题的谈判不可能在几天甚至几周内完成。”

相比之下，里亚布科夫语气紧迫，并补充道，“在未来几天，是否会进行另一轮谈判将会更加清晰，如果会，以什么形式进行。”

周三北约-俄罗斯会议结束后，周四将在欧洲安全与合作组织举行第三轮会谈。该组织是一个冷战时期的论坛，在俄罗斯领导的部队与乌克兰政府作战时，在乌克兰东部部署了一名战争监督员。

这场战争已造成约1.4万人死亡，还在继续，这是莫斯科继续破坏邻国乌克兰稳定的一种方式。乌克兰是一个前苏联国家，自2013年抗议推翻亲俄罗斯的寡头总统以来，一直寻求与西方建立更密切的关系。那次革命后，俄罗斯夺取了乌克兰的克里米亚半岛，并在被称为顿巴斯的东部省份发动了战争。

但是，大约10万俄罗斯军队以及重型装备的移动，引发了人们对可能的全面入侵的深切担忧。谢尔曼周一表示，尚不清楚普京做出了什么决定，但他呼吁俄罗斯将这些部队送回远离乌克兰边境的军营。

丹尼斯·巴里布塞/泳池通过美联社

美国副国务卿温迪·谢尔曼(左)和俄罗斯外交部副部长...

几十年来，俄罗斯一直在抱怨北约的扩张，包括莫斯科作为苏联主导的国家。现在，它认为乌克兰已经与北约走得太近，认为北约提供军事顾问和装备来帮助乌克兰在与俄罗斯的战争中自卫，意味着它正在成为北约事实上的一部分。2008年，北约通过了一项决议，称乌克兰和格鲁吉亚有一天会成为联盟的一部分，但西方国家几乎不支持这种情况迅速发生。

俄罗斯认为迫使美国谈论其对乌克兰的担忧本身就是一个重要的胜利。里亚布科夫在会谈中表示，这给了一些乐观的理由。

“我不认为形势无望，”他继续说道。“我认为日内瓦会谈的用处主要在于，我们第一次能够谈论以前存在的问题，但好像是在幕后。”

但他说，俄罗斯希望北约利用今年在马德里举行的下一次峰会，放弃2008年的决议，该决议为乌克兰和格鲁吉亚加入北约开辟了道路，美国认为这一要求不会成功。

美国提出了增加透明度和减少双方猜疑的想法，包括减少核导弹和其他武器的部署——尽管谢尔曼表示，美国不会就其在欧洲的部队部署进行谈判，称这是一个只有美国及其盟友才能讨论的问题。

“我们将在本周完成所有的讨论。我们会反思他们所有人。我希望将这些结合起来，与我们在北约、OSCE的伙伴和盟友进行对话，然后我们将与俄罗斯政府进行进一步的对话，并决定最佳的前进方式。

然而，对俄罗斯来说，拒绝乌克兰和格鲁吉亚加入北约并不是外交解决的好兆头。乌克兰和格鲁吉亚是另一个前苏联国家，俄罗斯军队目前占领了该国的部分地区。问题是:如果美国和北约在这条线上保持坚定，莫斯科会接受其他任何东西吗，还是它的部队会发动攻击?

里亚布科夫说，达成协议仍然是“可能的”，但结束北约的扩张是“绝对必要的”

US, Russia talks end with 'no progress': Here's what you need to know

U.S. and Russian officials held over seven hours of talks Monday, but the two sides did not negotiate or appear any closer to a resolution over heightened fears that Russia will attack its neighbor Ukraine.

In dueling press conferences after the talks, the top U.S. and Russian diplomats said their meetings were constructive, as they now move on to a second round at NATO's headquarters on Wednesday.

But while U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman urged caution and praised the "frank and forthright" tone, her counterpart, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, warned the U.S. is moving too slowly and not taking seriously Moscow's key demands.

Whether that sets the stage for genuine negotiations, or whether Russian leader Vladimir Putin is seeking a pretext for war, remains unclear, as Russia pushes to reclaim its Soviet sphere of influence and present its clearest, most fundamental challenge to European security in three decades.

Ryabkov said it is impossible for any progress to be made until the U.S. gives legal guarantees Ukraine and Georgia will never join NATO.

"We are fed up with loose talk, half promises. Ukraine and Georgia will never -- never ever -- become members of NATO," Ryabkov told reporters afterward, reiterating Russia's top demand, laid out last month in two draft treaties. "We do not trust the other side. We need ironclad, waterproof, bullet-proof, legally binding guarantees. Not safeguards -- guarantees."

He has said "no progress" was made on Russia's central demands and warned the U.S. is failing to understand the urgency of the situation.

Even as he denied the approximately 100,000 Russian troops on three sides of Ukraine's borders are preparations for an invasion, Ryabkov again warned Ukraine could spark conflict with a "provocation,"

"Enough is enough. The station now is so dangerous and so precarious that we cannot afford any further delays," he added.

But Sherman made clear that the U.S. will not bend on what it sees as a key principle -- that countries like Ukraine can make their own decisions about joining an alliance. Instead, she said the U.S. offered "preliminary ideas" on how to ease tensions and promote transparency between the world's two largest nuclear powers, including reducing missile deployments or military exercises.

"We certainly urged Russia to deescalate, to create an environment that is conducive to the diplomatic track, but we will see," she told reporters,

While the two sides gained "a better understanding of each other and each other's priorities and concerns," she said, they weren't engaged in negotiations just yet: "We're not at a point where we're ready to set down texts and begin to go back and forth."

"We must give diplomacy and dialogue the time and space required to make progress on such complex issues," she added, saying the U.S. would "move as expeditiously as we possibly can," but that, "Negotiations on complex topics like arms control cannot be completed in a matter of days or even weeks."

In contrast, Ryabkov struck a tone of urgency, adding, "In the coming days there will be more full clarity whether another round will take place, if yes, in what format."

After the NATO-Russia meeting Wednesday, there will be a third round of talks Thursday at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, a Cold War-era forum that has deployed a war monitor in eastern Ukraine as Russian-led forces battle the Ukrainian government.

That war, which has killed approximately 14,000 people and counting, is one way Moscow continues to destabilize its neighbor Ukraine, a former Soviet state that has sought closer ties to the West since protests toppled a pro-Russian oligarch president in 2013. After that revolution, Russia seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula and launched the war in the eastern provinces known as Donbas.

But the movement of approximately 100,000 Russian troops, along with heavy equipment, has sparked deep concerns about a possible full-scale invasion. Sherman said Monday it was still unclear what Putin had decided but called on Russia to return those forces to their barracks away from Ukraine's borders.

Russia has complained for decades about NATO’s expansion to include countries that Moscow dominated as the Soviet Union. Now it has argued that Ukraine has moved too close to the alliance, arguing that NATO military advisors and equipment provided to help Ukraine defend itself in its war with Russia mean it is becoming a de-facto part of it. In 2008, NATO adopted a resolution that stated Ukraine and Georgia would one day become part of the alliance, but there is little support among Western countries for that to happen quickly.

Russia views having forced the U.S. to talk about its concerns around Ukraine is an important victory in itself. Ryabkov at the talks suggested that had given grounds for some optimism.

"I don’t consider the situation hopeless,” he continued. “I think the usefulness of the talks in Geneva is mainly that, for the first time, we were able to talk about issues that before existed, but as if behind the scenes.”

But he said Russia wants NATO to use its next summit in Madrid this year to renounce the 2008 resolution that opened a path for Ukraine and Georgia to join, a demand that has been seen as a non-starter by the U.S.

The U.S. has floated ideas to increase transparency and reduce suspicions between the two sides, including reductions on the deployment of nuclear missiles and other weapons -- although Sherman said the U.S. will not negotiate on the deployment of its forces in Europe, saying it's an issue for only the U.S. and its allies to discuss.

"We will go through all of the discussions this week. We will reflect on them all. I expect that incorporating those, talking with our partners and allies at NATO, at OSCE -- we will then have further conversations with the Russian government and decide on the best way forward," she said.

For Russia, however, that rejection of NATO membership for Ukraine and Georgia, another former Soviet state where Russian forces currently occupy parts of the country, does not bode well for a diplomatic solution. The question is: If the U.S. and NATO hold firm on that line, will Moscow accept anything else instead, or will its forces attack?

An agreement is still "possible," Ryabkov said, but ending NATO's expansion is "an absolute imperative."