Leonid Slutsky: “Without exaggeration, the attention of the whole world was riveted to the online summit of the Presidents of the Russian Federation and the United States. And although the details of this fateful conversation between Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden are unlikely to ever become fully known to the general public, the rather laconic messages from both sides still give reason to hope that the tension of the last month will subside, as well as the degree of anti-Russian hysteria in the Western political and media space.
The most important issues were discussed, including the problems of strategic stability and cyber security. And, of course, the situation with Ukraine, around which a real “pre-war” hysteria has been whipped up by Washington lately. Biden, after the failure of the United States in Afghanistan, apparently desperately needs an increase in his rating by “preventing” a new war, which Russia certainly did not intend to start.
In this light, the US President reiterated the allegedly “threatening” nature of the movement of Russian troops near the Ukrainian borders and spoke of sanctions that the United States and its allies would be ready to apply in the event of an escalation on the border with Ukraine. For his part, Vladimir Putin explained that it is NATO that is making dangerous attempts to conquer Ukrainian territory and build up its military potential at the Russian borders, while simultaneously illustrating Kiev’s destructive line on dismantling the Minsk agreements. At the same time, the Russian leader directly indicated those “red lines”, the crossing of which is unacceptable for Moscow. Russia is interested in obtaining legally fixed guarantees excluding the expansion of the Alliance to the east and the deployment of offensive strike systems in neighboring countries.
At the end of the videoconference, the American side again launched threats to halt the launch of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. The White House called it “a lever of pressure on Moscow so that it does not risk an invasion of Ukraine.” Note, however, that during the talks between the two presidents, it became known that amendments by congressmen were excluded from the draft US defense budget agreed by the two chambers of Congress, which implied the imposition of sanctions against SP-2 and a ban on the acquisition of sovereign debt obligations of the Russian Federation by US persons, as well as sanctions against 35 Russians “from Putin’s entourage.” So while words are words, and deeds are deeds …
Despite the differences in approaches, the leaders of Russia and the United States agreed to instruct their representatives to begin consultations on the entire spectrum of issues, and the White House said that “for de-escalation in Ukraine, there must be a negotiation path that meets the concerns of the United States, NATO, and Russia.” On the whole, the results of the summit, as they say, give grounds for cautious optimism, although, of course, no one expects miracles. There are too many sharp contradictions, they have been accumulating for too long …”
