Russia Confirms Putin-Trump Summit in Coming Days, Citing UAE as a ‘Suitable’ Site

President Putin has agreed to meet with President Trump in the “coming days” in what would be their first meeting in person since Mr. Trump’s re-election last year.Kremlin officials confirmed on Thursday that Mr. Putin will participate in the high-level summit but at the same time dismissed a proposal by Mr. Trump for a three-way meeting with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky.“At the suggestion of the American side, an agreement in principle was made to hold a bilateral meeting at the highest level in the coming days,” Mr. Putin’s longtime foreign policy aide, Yury Ushakov, said in an audio statement.According to Mr. Ushakov, the concept of a meeting involving Messrs. Trump, Putin, and Zelensky “for some reason was mentioned by Washington yesterday” though it was “not specifically discussed.” He noted that Russia had “left this option completely, completely without comment.”Mr. Putin later told reporters in Moscow that a meeting with Mr. Zelensky was possible but that certain conditions must first be met, according to Russia’s TASS news agency. “Unfortunately, it’s still a long way to go for the creation of such conditions,” the agency quoted him as saying.An exact date for the summit was not immediately given by the Putin aide. But TASS reported that next week “has been set as a tentative timeframe for a meeting” and said preparations are under way. Mr. Putin also said the United Arab Emirates would be a “suitable” location for the meeting. Mr. Ushakov said the site has already been agreed upon and that the Kremlin will announce it “a little later.”When asked whether America or Russia initiated the proposal for a meeting, he said, “Interest was shown on both sides. Who said what first? It is no longer important.”White House officials were quick to refute the claims made by Mr. Putin on a location, telling ABC News that that no location has been set and that he must agree to meet with Mr. Zelensky for the meeting with Mr. Trump to occur.The official said that both sides are still in the planning stages and that a meeting could occur as soon as next week. The initial reports followed Trump envoy Steve Witkoff’s friendly visit to Moscow the previous day, when he met with Mr. Putin and an associate, Kirill Dmitriev, who serves as investment chief. After this trip, the American president expressed optimism about a potential meeting with Mr. Putin in the coming week and alluded to possible three-way discussions.News of the meeting comes just one day after Mr. Witkoff arrived at Moscow in advance of the expiration of a 10-day deadline from Mr. Trump for Russia to end its war on Ukraine.“We have a meeting with Russia tomorrow. We’re going to see what happens. We’ll make that determination at that time,” Mr. Trump told reporters ahead of the Witkoff visit.In a recent interview on CNBC, the president elaborated on his threat to impose crippling tariffs on countries that continue to buy oil from Russia.“If energy goes down enough, Putin is going to stop killing people. Putin will stop killing people if we get energy down another $10 a barrel,” he said. “He’ll have no choice because his economy stinks.”

Russia Confirms Putin-Trump Summit in Coming Days, Citing UAE as a ‘Suitable’ Site

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