The Kremlin has reportedly said that Russian President Vladimir Putin will most likely meet with President Donald Trump at an economic summit in Vietnam later this week, and that both sides are discussing the timing.
“The relevant services are trying to choose the most suitable time and format,” Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters in a daily briefing call, Interfax reported.
Peskov said the “likelihood is great” that the two leaders will meet.
The meeting would take place at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit that starts Wednesday in Danang, Vietnam, and which Trump will attend as part of his 13-day Asia tour. Beginning the trip, Trump said he expected to meet with Putin and wanted to enlist him in resolving the North Korea nuclear crisis.
“We want Putin’s help on North Korea,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One while flying to Japan Sunday.
Any meeting between Putin and Trump will attract intense attention, coming amid a run of recent developments in connection to the U.S. special counsel investigation of Russia’s involvement in the U.S. presidential elections, and the backdrop of the continuing crisis with North Korea.
Trump and Putin first met in July at a G-20 summit in Germany, where they spoke for two hours. Trump said he had directly confronted Putin over Russia’s meddling in the U.S. election. Both men expressed enthusiasm about the meeting afterward.
After a summer of exchanging fiery rhetoric with North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un, Trump has said putting an end to the standoff over the country’s nuclear arms testing is atop his agenda during the Asia trip.
On the tour so far, he has moderated his threats to the North, and in South Korea Wednesday called on it to “come to the table.”
Trump appears to view Russia as important in achieving that.
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SOURCE: ABC News, Patrick Reevell
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