HAMBURG – President Donald Trump opened his first meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday by raising U.S. concerns about Moscow’s meddling in the 2016 presidential election, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said. He said Putin denied being involved.
Trump’s decision to confront Putin directly over election interference fulfilled ardent demands by U.S. lawmakers of both parties that the president not shy away from the issue in his highly anticipated meeting with Putin. Trump has avoided stating unequivocally in the past that Russia interfered, even as investigations proceed into whether Trump’s campaign colluded with Russians who sought to help him win.
Putin’s denial of culpability notwithstanding, he and Trump agreed that the issue has become a hindrance to better relations between the two powers, said Tillerson, who attended the more-than-two-hour meeting along with Russia’s foreign minister. Tillerson said the discussion about the election meddling was “robust and lengthy.”
According to Lavrov, Trump told Putin some circles in America were “exaggerating” allegations of Russian interference in the US election.
— Steve Rosenberg (@BBCSteveR) July 7, 2017
Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Tillerson said the two leaders had agreed to continue the discussion, with an eye toward securing a commitment that Russia won’t interfere in U.S. affairs in the future.
“I think the president is rightly focused on how do we move forward from something that may be an intractable disagreement at this point,” Tillerson said.
But deep skepticism about Russia in the U.S. and ongoing investigations into whether Trump’s campaign coordinated with Moscow during last year’s election have made a U.S.-Russia detente politically risky for Trump.
The Putin meeting came midway through a hectic, four-day European visit for Trump, who addressed thousands of Poles in an outdoor speech in Warsaw, Poland, on Thursday. He met in Germany with Chancellor Angela Merkel, the summit host, and had dinner with two Asian allies, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and South Korean President Moon Jae-in, to discuss North Korea’s aggression.
DARLENE SUPERVILLE
KEN THOMAS
