Azernews.Az

By Kamila Aliyeva

The meeting between the presidents of Russia and the U.S., Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump was "robust and lengthy", while they mulled Russian interference in the U.S. elections and agreed to a new ceasefire agreement for Syria in their first fact-to-face meeting.

The two leaders met on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Hamburg for talks in which they also discussed the war in Ukraine, the North Korean nuclear crisis and cyber security.

The White House said in advance that 35 minutes had been allotted for the meeting. But it extended well beyond that, clocking in at 2 hours and 16 minutes.

Trump offered no details about what issues he and the Russian leader had discussed, describing them only as "various things." Putin was similarly vague, telling reporters through a translator that they were discussing international problems and bilateral issues.

Vladimir Putin expressed hope that certain groundwork for a recovery of relations between Russia and the United States has been laid at the meeting.

Putin has said that he has been able to establish personal relations with Donald Trump and this may help restore bilateral relations. "As for personal relations, I believe that they have been established," the Russian leader said.

"I don’t know how this may sound but I’ll say what I see: Trump on TV differs very strongly from the real person," Putin said, explaining that the US president "is an absolutely concrete person who perceives an interlocutor absolutely adequately, analyzes quickly enough and responds to the formulated questions or some new elements that arise during a discussion."

Putin, while addressing press conference following the G20 summit in Hamburg on July 8, said that his U.S. counterpart repeatedly raised the issue of Moscow’s alleged interference in the presidential elections.

The Russian leader said Trump took note of the arguments that Moscow had never meddled in the US political process and, probably, agreed with them.

Russia’s possible interference in the 2016 election is currently under FBI and congressional investigation.

Speaking alongside Putin before the talks began, Trump called it an "honour" to meet the Russian president and that he looked forward to “positive things” happening in the relationship.

"We've had some very, very good talks. We're going to have a talk now and obviously that will continue. We look forward to a lot of very positive things happening for Russia, for the United States and for everybody concerned" Trump said.

The practical result of the talks became the decision of the presidents to create a working group on cybersecurity. The goal of the group is to understand how to jointly control security in the field of cyberspace and not to interfere in the internal affairs of foreign states.

The presidents also agreed on de-escalation in the south-west of Syria. The de-escalation will be provided by the Russian military police with the help of the United States and Jordan.

When discussing the conflict in Ukraine, Trump said that the American side created the post of special representative for the Ukrainian issue.

"Arrangements have been made to create a channel between presidents of Russia and US to use this opportunity that Washington has, to further advance the settlement based on the Minsk agreements and considering the potential established in the contact group and the Normandy format," Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told reporters during the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany.

Moscow hopes to soon meet the US representative "for consultations," he added.

Experts continue to be critical on the meeting having a significant result. However, it might be viewed as a good start for restoring relations as it will lead to increased dialogue between the two countries.

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Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva

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