U.S. President Joe Biden once recalled looking Putin within the eye during a personal meeting and saying, “I don’t think you’ve got a soul,” to which the Russian leader replied, “We understand one another .” the 2 veteran politicians are not any strangers. they need decades of political experience and share a preference for aviator sunglasses, but don’t expect the highly anticipated summit between the 2 presidents in Geneva on Wednesday to thaw frozen U.S.-Russian relations. “There’s no appetite for a reset on either side,” said Charles Kupchan, senior fellow and director of European studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, who is predicated in Washington, D.C. Kupchan said “Biden goes into this meeting with eyes wide open,” knowing that on a number of the foremost contentious issues — aggression in Ukraine, cybersecurity and a crackdown on Russian dissidents like Alexei Navalny — “he is unlikely to urge Putin to budge.” So why a summit? Talking is best than not, consistent with each side .
Putin acknowledged in an NBC interview on Friday that “the bilateral relationship has deteriorated to its lowest point in recent years.” The Russian president who supported — some say manipulated — former U.S. president Donald Trump described Biden as “radically different” and said he hoped “there won’t be any impulse-based movement” on Biden’s behalf. But Biden features a long list of grievances, accusing Russia of inflaming conflicts abroad and brutally suppressing opposition reception .
The U.S. wants “a stable and predictable relationship” going forward, said Biden, but warned he won’t treat Putin with kid gloves. “We’re not seeking conflict with Russia … but i have been clear: the us will respond during a robust and meaningful way if the Russian government engages in harmful activities,” Biden said in Mildenhall, England, at the beginning of G7 meetings this past weekend. Meeting is about ‘world security’ White House officials say that when he meets face to face with Putin in an ornate 18th-century Swiss villa, Biden will speak on to U.S. election interference, further aggression in Ukraine, recent cyberattacks on U.S. infrastructure linked to hackers in Russia and therefore the poisoning of dissidents. one among the contentious issues for Biden is Russia’s treatment of dissidents, including opposition politician Alexei Navalny, seen during a mural in Saint Petersburg, which reads, ‘The hero of the new age.’ (Anton Vaganov/Reuters) Some Republicans have labelled Biden “weak” for even offering Putin a world platform. Republican Sen. Ben Sasse called the summit Putin’s “reward,” concluding the Russian leader will use it to project a picture , especially domestically, that he’s on an equal footing with the new U.S. president. That’s short-sighted, says Masha Lipman, a Moscow-based political analyst and senior associate at PONARS Eurasia, at Washington University in D.C. “I don’t think it should be about rewarding or not rewarding.
It should be about world security, that’s what’s at stake,” she said. Lipman, a long-time political analyst in Moscow, describes current relations between Russia and therefore the U.S. as “dangerous” and a “new conflict .” “Not meeting, not talking in the least might cause a good deeper confrontation with really dramatic results,” she said. “Not only for the 2 countries, but maybe for the planet .” U.S attempts to contain or influence Putin are mixed at the best . Biden is that the fifth U.S. president to satisfy him, and every one has tried to unlock the Russian leader’s psyche and predict his strategy. George W. Bush famously said that by looking Putin within the eye, he got a way of his soul, and located him “straightforward and trustworthy.” Putin is seen with then-U.S. president George W. Bush on the grounds of Putin’s summer retreat in Sochi in April 2008.
(Kevin Lamarque/Reuters) As U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton reached for a “reset” with the Kremlin in 2009, trotting out a gimmicky red button at a press conference together with her Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov. Five years later, Russia invaded Crimea and encroached on eastern Ukraine, prompting swift international sanctions, including from Canada, many of which are still in situ today. Strained relations Today, both the Russian and U.S. ambassadors have left their posts, returning to their home countries after U.S intelligence agencies accused Russia of interfering within the 2020 election. WATCH | Biden addresses findings of Russian interference in 2020 U.S. election: The U.S. president is predicted to announce new sanctions on Russia in response to alleged election interference and malicious cyberactivity targeting several individuals and entities. 4:12 In an April interview with ABC News, Biden was asked, “Do you think that Putin’s a killer?” Biden replied, “I do.”
The cumulative effect is severely strained diplomatic relations. “Biden won’t be a simple partner for Putin,” predicted Andrey Kortunov, director general of the Russian world affairs Council (RIAC) in Moscow. Putin liked Trump but he clothed to be unreliable from the Kremlin’s perspective, weakened by the pressures of U.S. domestic politics, says Kortunov. The Russian president are going to be calculating if Biden may be a “good investment.” “Biden are often tough on Putin. He could be very critical of Russia,” Kurtonov said, but the question for Putin is whether or not Biden can deliver on any commitments of mutual interest, “and that question remains open.” U.S. president Donald Trump’s meeting with Putin in Helsinki, Finland, in 2018 was the topic of much speculation. During a joint news conference , Trump contradicted his own intelligence agencies’ assessment of Russia’s involvement within the 2016 U.S. election. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters) Leading up to the summit, Putin has publicly said that he’s not getting to discuss Russia’s domestic policy with President Biden. “We haven’t any disagreements with the us ,” Putin told a live television audience just two months ago. “They only have one disagreement: they need to stifle our development.” ‘Biden wants to lower the temperature’ The White home is downplaying the “deliverables” for improving the connection , but on the weekend, Biden inferred the 2 countries might find footing on “strategic stability” (like upholding limitation agreements), the pandemic, global climate change and even a tacit understanding to not harbour cybersecurity criminals in their respective countries. “Biden wants to lower the temperature. He wants to form the connection less poisonous, then maybe down the road, this will create space for tackling the tougher issues,” said Kupchan, who shuttled between Washington, Kyiv and Moscow as U.S. president Barack Obama’s senior director for European affairs on the National Security Council . The summit is about fixing early work to urge to the larger challenges, sort of a rising China, says Kupchan, who calculates the Biden administration could also be trying to find openings to start to woo Russia faraway from China. “Is Putin getting to play ball thereon front? No. Might it bear fruit over subsequent few years? Possibly,” he said.
Charles Kupchan, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, says U.S. President Joe Biden isn’t trying to find trouble abroad, sees China because the big issue and needs to form relations with Russia ‘less toxic.’ (Paul Andre St.-Onge Fleurent/CBC) Important to ‘restart a dialogue’ On Wednesday, Switzerland will again be at the centre of international intrigue. it had been in Geneva that president Reagan and his Soviet counterpart, Gorbachev , met in 1985 to barter a landmark agreement on limitation . Don’t expect that sort of impact this point . “Anything but a transparent failure should be considered success if they simply restart a dialogue,” said Kortunov. Also, don’t expect to observe the 2 test one another at a joint news conference — the White House has nixed that. Biden said Sunday that he didn’t want to be diverted by the media dissecting their visual communication and dwelling on “did they shake hands” and “who talked the foremost .” “This isn’t a contest about who can do better ahead of a news conference to undertake to embarrass one another ,” Biden added. presumably it had been a strategic decision to deprive Putin of another photo opportunity next to a U.S. president, a sort of exorcism of the ghost of the 2018 Helsinki Summit where Trump, standing next to Putin, undercut U.S. intelligence on 2016 election meddling and said he didn’t believe Russia was responsible .
This summit are going to be far different — more socially and politically distanced, as befits the days . “I think tons can fail ,” said Lipman, “but it is vital that regardless of how different the stances of the 2 presidents, regardless of how deep the distrust, that they struggle and succeed to stay civil.”
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