Russian Foreign Minister Igor and US Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott met on October 29 in Moscow to discuss the situation in Russia's Chechnya and joint efforts to solve the Nagorno-Karabakh issue.

The meeting was held inside the Russian Foreign Ministry behind closed doors.

Talbott told reporters after the meeting that he had conveyed Washington's concerns over Chechnya, where Russian federal troops are fighting Islamic militants.

The federal assault on the breakaway republic came after Chechen rebels twice infiltrated neighboring Daghestan and a series of terrorist bombings in Moscow and two other Russian cities that killed some 300 people. Chechen warlords Shamil Basayev and Khattab, a Jordanian native known only by his last name, have been accused of masterminding the blasts.

Talbott said the US realizes that Russia faces a very dangerous threat in the form of extremism and terrorism and that it has the right and duty to protect the state and its citizens, the Interfax news agency reported.

Meanwhile, Talbott said, Washington hopes that Russia will find a way to overcome the serious challenge that keeps civilian casualties to a minimum, Talbott said.

He expressed the hope that Moscow will use political levers in its strategy as soon as possible to guarantee stability in the North Caucasus.

On Nagorno-Karabakh, Talbott said the shootout Wednesday inside the Armenian parliament building that killed the country's prime minister, parliament speaker and several others might harm the talks on the settlement.

Nagorno-Karabakh, an Armenian enclave inside Azerbaijan, has strained relations between the two former Soviet republics for about a decade.

Both Washington and Moscow agreed that the Karabakh settlement process must continue, Talbott said.

Besides Chechnya and Karabakh, Ivanov and Talbott, who arrived in Moscow Thursday evening, also discussed arms control issues such as the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, Russian media reported.

Talbott is scheduled to fly to Yerevan later Friday to mourn the deaths of Armenian Prime Minister Vazgen Sarkisyan, Parliament Speaker Karen Demirchyan and other senior officials, Interfax reported.

Ivanov did not meet with the press following his talks with Talbott, but he told a seminar later that Russia is deeply concerned by some countries' attempts to alter the basic elements of international law.

He said that suggestions about limited sovereignty and interventions on humanitarian grounds would result in power politics in international affairs.