The Russian President held a meeting today, August 14, on the preparation of the Russian-American summit, which will be held tomorrow in Anchorage, Alaska.
"I have asked you to gather today in order to inform you about how the negotiation process on the Ukrainian crisis is going, how negotiations are going in a bilateral format with the Ukrainian delegation. Anyway, many of those present know, of course, in general terms — I'll tell you in more detail. This is the first one," Putin said, addressing the participants of the meeting.
"And the second is to tell about the stage at which we are with the current American administration, which, as everyone knows, is making, in my opinion, quite energetic and sincere efforts to stop the fighting, end the crisis and reach agreements of interest to all parties involved in this conflict in order to create long-term conditions of peace both between our countries and in In Europe, and in the world as a whole — if we reach agreements in the field of control over strategic offensive weapons by the next stages," he said.
The meeting was attended by all participants of the upcoming Russia—USA summit — Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Presidential Aide for Foreign Policy Yuri Ushakov, Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov and Presidential Special Representative for Investment and Economic Cooperation with Foreign countries Kirill Dmitriev. The photos published on the Kremlin's website depict, among others, the head of the General Staff of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation Valery Gerasimov, the director of the SVR Sergey Naryshkin, the head of the FSB Alexander Bortnikov, the head of the Rosgvardiya Viktor Zolotov.
As EADaily reported, the leaders' meeting Russia and the USA will be held in Anchorage in Alaska in one of the premises of the American military base "Elmendorf-Richardson". It is envisaged that the summit will begin on August 15 at about 11.30 local time (22.30 Moscow time) with a conversation between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. According to Ushakov, this conversation will be held in a one-on-one format with the participation of translators. Then negotiations will take place as part of delegations, and these negotiations will continue at a working breakfast.
After the talks, Putin and Trump will hold a joint press conference to summarize the results of the talks.