Trump: I want to get along with Russia, and I think we will

U.S. President Donald Trump said he will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the G20 summit in Osaka.

In an interview on Fox News, the U.S. leader said he would hold meetings with Putin and Xi Jinping. Trump noted that he wants to get along with both Russia and China. "And I think we will," CNBC cited him as saying. 

"I’m meeting actually both of them next week in Japan at the G20," Trump said, speaking about the possible talks with the Russian and Chinese leaders.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov earlier said that a full-fledged meeting between Putin and Trump could take place on the eve of the G20 summit, but noted that Russia had not yet received a go-ahead from Washington. "This [the meeting’s organization] may happen even on the eve of the G20’s beginning," the spokesman said.

The G20 summit will be held in the Japanese city of Osaka on 28-29 June.

The deputy head of the Council of the Russian Diplomats Association, Andrey Baklanov, speaking to Vestnik Kavkaza, noted that all the key topics of Russian-U.S. relations currently need a serious discussion at the high level. "These are the global military-political situation, the state of affairs in individual regions, the general vector of the global political development, and a very complex, unstable situation in the trade, economic and financial spheres. In recent months, we have not moved forward. There was only the exhaustion of the potential of those agreements that existed before. Especially in the terms of arms deterrence," he said in the first place.

"Trump’s words about his desire to be friends with Russia can only be welcomed, but for now it's just words," the Russian diplomat pointed out.

"In addition, Trump is still in a rather difficult situation. It is under great doubt whether he is able to realistically implement the attitude voiced today. It would be very good if Trump kept a promise to improve relations with Russia at least once," Andrey Baklanov stressed.

Director of the Institute of Political Studies Sergei Markov, in turn, indicated the restoration of working contacts as the main topic. "Over the past 5 years, working contacts between Moscow and Washington have been destroyed at the level of the Ministries of Defense, security services, including the CIA and the FSB, the Ministries of Economy, the Ministries of Justice. Constant contacts are needed between parliamentarians and civil societies. Restoration of a huge number of bilateral contacts is the number one challenge for the Putin-Trump meeting in Osaka," he noted.

"The second topic is Ukraine. We don’t know if Trump dares to advance in solving this problem. He needs something else from Ukraine - the leverage against Joe Biden, his main competitor in the presidential election campaign. It turned out that Biden was engaged in some corruption affairs there," Sergey Markov said.

"We can expect that the issue of cooperation between Russia and the United States against China will be raised. Vladimir Putin will have to do some delicate work by talking about areas of Russia-U.S. cooperation, which will be perceived by the Americans as anti-Chinese, but at the same time they shouldn't be anti-Chinese. Another issue is Iran. The U.S. threatens Iran with war, but on the other hand, many people believe that this war is not beneficial to Trump, because he cannot start his election campaign against the background of the coffins of American soldiers and possible terrorist attacks," the political scientist stressed.

"Another topic is Syria. I think that cooperation between Russia and the United States in Syria is possible, but largely on Russia's conditions. In general, Trump is in a convenient position to build relations with Russia. Most Americans consider America’s conflict with Russia as artificial, and its termination is one of the key megadasks facing Trump," Sergey Markov concluded.