U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will form part of the US delegation to the meeting between U.S. President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva, a statement by US State Department Spokesperson Ned Price published on Monday informs.
The statement says that Blinken "will participate in President Biden's bilateral meeting with Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin in Geneva" on June 16.
"On June 10-12, the Secretary will take part in the President’s bilateral engagements around the G7 meeting in Cornwall. He will then accompany the President to the NATO Summit on June 14 and the U.S.-EU Summit on June 15, both in Brussels," the spokesperson stated.
Earlier, the Kremlin and the White House announced that the much-awaited summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his U.S. counterpart Joe Biden would take place in Geneva, Switzerland, on June 16. This will be the first face-to-face meeting between Putin and Biden since the 46th US.. president took office. It will also be the first Russian-U.S. summit since July 2018, when Putin met with then U.S. President Donald Trump in Helsinki, Finland, TASS reported.
According to the Kremlin, the heads of state will discuss the conditions and prospects for further fostering Russian-U.S. relations, strategic stability matters as well as pressing issues on the international agenda, which include cooperation in fighting the pandemic and regulating regional conflicts. On May 30, Biden stated that he plans to discuss the topic of human rights during the summit.
