Tillerson will soon hold a press conference with Lavrov, where it is highly likely that the contents of the Putin meeting shall be discussed.
Rycroft was among the Western ambassadors who blasted Russian Federation earlier Wednesday for continuing to support Assad even after his alleged use of sarin on a rebel-held area of his country.
Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday trust had eroded between the United States and Russian Federation under President Donald Trump, as Moscow delivered an unusually hostile reception to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in a face-off over Syria. "I expressed the view that the current state is at a low point", Tillerson said in introductory remarks before taking questions from reporters in Moscow.
Lavrov says Russian Federation thinks there is no need for a U.N. Security Council resolution on the attack until the U.N. chemical weapons watchdog has completed an objective probe.
Moscow's hostility to Trump administration figures is a sharp change from a year ago, when Mr Putin hailed Mr Trump as a strong figure and Russian state television was consistently full of effusive praise for him. However, a Syrian military source told Russian state media on April 4 that regime forces had not carried out any airstrike in Khan Shaykhun, contradicting Russia's claim. Though President Donald Trump has spoken with Putin by phone, the meeting was believed to be the first between Putin and a top member of Trump's administration since the new American president took office in January.
Putin met with Tillerson in Moscow on Wednesday. The diplomats know each other well from Tillerson's days as Exxon Mobil CEO. Tillerson is a former oil executive who was awarded Russia's Order of Friendship by Putin.
Beyond Syria, Russia's alleged meddling in the U.S. presidential election also hovered over what was the first face-to-face encounter between Mr Putin and any Trump administration Cabinet member. The president said "when you see kids choking to death, you watch their lungs burning out, we had to hit [Assad] and hit him hard".
"When you drop gas, or bombs, or barrel bombs - they have these massive barrels with dynamite and they drop them right in the middle of a group of people - and in all fairness, you see the same kids with no arms, no legs, no face. No one showed us anything, no one said anything, although we repeatedly asked to produce the details on which these unfounded accusations lie".
Russian Federation has criticized previous investigations carried out by the OPCW and the United Nations which blamed the Syrian government for at least three chemical weapons attacks without visiting the sites.
Still, Tillerson sought to stress the positives from his meetings.
Reporters asked whether Tillerson had introduced evidence at Wednesday's meetings of Russian interference in the US election.
Comedian Charlie Murphy dies
He was also part of the ongoing Comedy Get Down Tour with Cedric the Entertainer, Eddie Griffin , D.L. After a battle with leukemia, comedian and actor Charlie Murphy has died.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov agreed there were many problems, but stressed that Moscow was "open to dialogue with the U.S. in all different areas".
It was the latest sharp split between the United States and Russian Federation over the incident, which has deepened antagonism between the two countries in the wake of the attack.
White House spokesman Sean Spicer on Wednesday said that the president was not ruling out another attack on Syrian government installations if Assad continued to use chemical weapons against civilians.
The stark language is the most blunt terms Trump has used to describe the Syrian president who is accused of war crimes in an attempt to hold onto power during a prolonged civil war. "We are ready to help bring this conflict to an end", US Ambassador Nikki Haley told the Security Council as it met.
United States officials have suggested Russian forces may have colluded in the latest atrocity blamed on Assad s regime, and it remained unclear if Tillerson will be invited to meet Putin.
Expectations for U.S. secretary of state Rex Tillerson's visit to Moscow were not high.
At their meeting, Lavrov told Tillerson Moscow was hoping to understand Washington s "real intentions" and warned that Moscow considered it "fundamentally important" to prevent more "unlawful" United States strikes against its ally Syria.
Tillerson and Lavrov maintained a diplomatic tone during their chilly joint press conference, but the growing tensions following the USA strike on a Syrian airbase last week in retaliation for Assad's lethal chemical attack on his own people were crystal-clear, as Tillerson suggested war crimes charges could be levied against the Syrian leader and repeated the White House's belief that "the reign of the Assad family is coming to an end". "And we had the most lovely piece of chocolate cake that you've ever seen and President Xi was enjoying it", Trump told the Fox Business television network.
"We're not going into Syria", he said in excerpts of the interview on the station's website.
Trump's relations with Russian Federation are also a domestic issue, as US intelligence agencies have accused Moscow of using computer hacking to intervene in the election to help Trump win.
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