The Kremlin’s response to Donald Trump’s comments regarding a possible meeting with Vladimir Putin can be summed up in two words: “Yes, but…”.
Spokesman Dmitry Peskov was typically non-committal on his daily conference call with journalists, talking up the importance of a summit between the leaders while simultaneously playing down expectations that it will happen any time soon.
He described such a meeting as “essential” and “necessary”. He even said it was “hard to overestimate” the importance of it – deploying the kind of flattery we’ve got used to hearing from Moscow when it knows America is listening.
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Trump on meeting Putin: ‘As soon as we can set it up’
But Mr Peskov also said, practically in the same breath, that a meeting required “advance preparation”, which can be “lengthy”. In short, don’t get your hopes up…
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The prospect of a bilateral meeting has been talked about since Trump came into office, with both sides repeatedly saying that preparations were under way.
That talk has dropped off somewhat in the past few weeks, since Washington’s stance in the peace negotiations has appeared to shift in favour of Ukraine.
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But now, Trump is casting a one-on-one with Putin as the keystone to peace. There will be no movement towards peace without it, he said on Thursday.
It’s exactly the position Moscow craves – carving up Ukraine without Kyiv at the table.
So if that’s the context, I’m sure Vladimir Putin will want to sit down with the US president. But for now, it seems, it will be at a time of his choosing.