Patrick Semansky
There is some movement in some areas, a government official said on Wednesday after the talks in Geneva were concluded. However, it will take some time to see if this actually leads to results. “It’s different from flipping a light switch.” Putin and Biden had agreed, among other things, that the US and Russia would start talks on arms control and cybersecurity.
Konstantin Kosachev, Deputy Head of the Russian Federation Council, praised the agreement between the two heads of state on strategic arms control talks. Without such talks, the last major nuclear disarmament treaty would be doomed to failure, said Kosachev after the summit on Russian state television. But now there is the possibility that a new agreement will come about before the expiry of the so-called New Start contract. “That’s great.”
The meeting of the presidents of the world’s largest nuclear powers took place in the secluded Villa La Grange on Lake Geneva. It was the first meeting of the two since Biden took office in January and marked the end of the Democrat’s first trip abroad as US President. In the days before, Biden had met with traditional American allies in Europe and secured support for his meeting with Putin at high-level meetings of the seven major industrialized nations (G7), NATO and EU representatives.
The relationship between Moscow and Washington has been shattered for a long time. The summit took place at Biden’s invitation. The presidents then emphasized in separate press conferences that the conversation had been constructive. For several hours, a whole range of topics had been dealt with: In addition to issues of nuclear arms control, there were human rights, conflicts in Afghanistan, Syria and Libya, and the US lamented interference by Russia in US elections.
The CDU foreign politician Norbert Röttgen rated it as “good news” that Biden and Putin had started a conversation. “This is the beginning of the return of diplomatic normalcy, more could not be expected from this meeting,” said the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the “Augsburger Allgemeine”. The fact that the ambassadors of the USA and Russia should return to their place of work speaks for the mutual willingness to work on the relationship, said Röttgen. However, the “numerous conflicts would all remain”.
The German government’s transatlantic coordinator, Peter Beyer, sees Biden on the right track in dealing with Russia. “The West must find a good balance between pressure and dialogue,” said the CDU member of the Bundestag, the newspapers of the Funke media group. Biden will “not let Putin through” and openly address grievances such as dealing with Ukraine or the case of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny. “Putin takes Biden seriously, you can tell that.”
From the point of view of the former US security advisor John Bolton, Putin in particular benefited from the meeting. “I think he came out as the better, the greater beneficiary, simply because he had the meeting,” Bolton told CNN. While Putin knows exactly what he wants to achieve, Biden has no strategic goal in mind. “The White House has set the bar very low, and they just managed to get over it.”
Bolton was security advisor to Biden’s predecessor Donald Trump until 2019 and was present in this capacity at the summit between Trump and Putin in Helsinki in 2018. Trump then questioned the American secret services’ knowledge of Russia’s interference in the US elections, thereby duping his own people.
Obviously alluding to the US course under Trump, Democratic US Congressman Adam Schiff said it was time to change the tone of Russia. After Biden’s meeting with Putin, he wrote on Twitter: “America is again a strong, unwavering force for human rights and democracy around the world.” Putin’s behavior is no longer ignored. Biden had stated at his press conference that he had given Putin to understand that the US would continue to denounce human rights violations in Russia.
After the summit, Biden emphasized that it was crucial how things went from here. The next six or twelve months will show whether the strategic arms control dialogue is meaningful or not, whether there is an agreement on the release of prisoners or not, and whether an agreement on cybersecurity will be reached or not. The US blames Russian intelligence agencies for a massive hacker attack on government departments, other agencies and companies in the US. Putin again denied such allegations. (SDA)