"We have an excellent opportunity to reset the relationship between the United States and Russia on a whole host of issues," Obama said on Thursday after talks in Washington with Russia's top diplomat.
Lavrov called the talks "productive," noting their "constructive, business-like nature." He also said that Russian-U.S. relations should be based on mutual respect.
Obama said that he had discussed a wide range of issues with Lavrov, including Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan, nuclear proliferation, the financial crisis, and his upcoming visit to Moscow, scheduled for July.
After a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Lavrov said he hoped the work of the Russia-NATO Council would be resumed in the near future.
"We hope that in the near future the artificial obstacles in the way of the resumption of the Russia-NATO Council's work will be fully overcome and this important body will resume its work based on the principles agreed on when it was created," Lavrov told journalists.
Russia announced it was withdrawing from a planned Russia-NATO Council meeting later this month in response to the expulsion of two of its diplomats from Brussels. In response, Moscow announced the expulsion of two Canadian diplomats working in NATO's Information Office in Moscow.
Lavrov said the expulsion was an attempt to disrupt the resumption of Russia-NATO ties, suspended after Russia fought a brief war with Georgia over South Ossetia last August. However, he also said that disagreements were "natural for relations between any two large states".
Medvedev has called ongoing NATO-led military drills in Georgia an "open provocation." According to NATO, the drills are aimed at improving interoperability between NATO and partner countries, within the framework of Partnership for Peace, Mediterranean Dialogue and Istanbul Cooperation Initiative programs, and will not involve any light or heavy weaponry.
Lavrov's visit came after Georgian authorities blamed Russia for a brief military mutiny at a Georgian tank base earlier this week. However, Clinton and Lavrov said that arms reduction had taken precedence over the Georgian issue in their talks. Russia and the U.S. have begun work on a new treaty to replace the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, START I, which expires in December.
"If you look at what we are doing on START and non-proliferation, that has to do with the future safety of the world and the United States and Russia bear a special responsibility," Clinton said. She also said that she did not want to discuss Russia's position on NATO drills in Georgia, adding that, "We want to normalize the relationship [with Moscow] and raise it to a new level."
Lavrov added that arms reduction was too vital an issue to be made "hostage of any particular regime anywhere in the world."
The term "reset" has been used on a number of occasions by the Obama administration with relation to Russia-U.S. ties. In March, Clinton presented Lavrov with a yellow box with a large red "reset" button on it, which she asked Lavrov to push with her. On either side of the button the word "reset" was written in English and what was supposed to be a Russian translation. However, Washington's translators had made a mistake, writing the word, writing the Russian for "overload" on it instead.
