White House, Kremlin aim for Biden-Putin summit
WASHINGTON — The White House and the Kremlin are working to arrange a summit next month between President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Switzerland, according to officials.
National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan is meeting with his Russian counterpart in Geneva, the proposed host city, this week to finalize details, according to one U.S. official familiar with the preliminary planning but not authorized to discuss the deliberations publicly. Geneva is now expected to be the choice for Biden first face-to-face meeting with Putin as president, according to a second official.
The Americans and Russians are eyeing June 15-16 for the summit. An official announcement was expected in the coming days.
The summit would come at the end of Biden’s first foreign trip as president, a swing through Europe that includes a stop in the United Kingdom for a Group of Seven summit of leaders of the world’s richest nations, and then a visit to the Brussels headquarters of NATO, the longstanding military alliance built as a bulwark to Russian aggression.
Geneva, a rich, if mid-sized, city on the banks of Lake Geneva, offers bucolic vistas of the Mont Blanc peak — the highest in Western Europe — and a reputation as both a hub for international institutions and an icon of Switzerland’s much ballyhooed neutrality.
By Associated Press
