Yup, I watched and took notes.Trump was, surprisingly, diplomatic. Well spoken. Not verbose or brash.Putin, via a translator, was his usual self. Which means he spoke much as he does, every time I’ve watched/listened to him speak previously- Putin and Trump were both pragmatic. Putin spoke of first steps. Fine tuning dialogue.Apparently the START treaty was discussed. IMF. No weapons in space.Putin favoured continued cooperation between Russia and US.Treaty of ‘74 was mentioned wrt Golan Which suggests Putin is ok with Syria and Israel maintaining the status quo regarding Golan.Resolution 338 was also mentioned by Putin Putin mentioned North Korea, as well as broaching the p5+1 or JCPOA. He stated Iran became the most controlled nation on the planet. Putin talked trajectory of growth- restoration of cooperation etcTrump talked about Israel a bit too much. His first concern when Syria was brought up was for Israel. Then for civilians.His priorities are very clear!Trump will continue pressuring Iran- No Iranian involvement in SyriaAs for Ukraine? - Putin stated Trump made very clear his stance on Crimea. Which was Russia’s annexation illegal. Russia doesn’t see it that way. Elections. Referendum and mostly everyone is Russia there anyway.Trump brought up pipelines transiting Ukraine- Putin said they could work that out that so long as the US genuinely works on the agreement made at Minsk. (Dispute to be settled through Minsk)I’ve got about 8 small note pages of notes, so above is a brief synopsis of the press conferenceOf special interest: Putin spoke of Bill Browder - Browder being the impetus for the Magnistsky act and all those sanctions against Russia- Putin mentioned how much money he was able to extract from Russia inappropriately- Trump said nothing. There was NO agreement regarding Iran or the JCPOA. There was clearly no agreement regarding the Iran issue as it relates to Syria either. There was NO agreement with regard to Crimea. In other words there was NO Grand Deals made! Not that I expected anything like that to actually occur.Conclusion? Russia and the US remain far apart on a number of very important issues.
HELSINKI, July 16. /TASS/. A meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart Donald Trump has been going on for two hours. The two leaders are meeting tete-a-tete behind closed doors, a TASS correspondent reported from the scene.The Russian and US leaders began the talks with exchanging brief greetings. The Russian president said he would like to discuss relations between Russia and the US and global issues with the US counterpart. For his part, the US president noted the two countries have "a great opportunity together." "I think we will end up with an extraordinary relationship," he noted.The one-on-one meeting is expected to continue with the participation of delegation members, and the two leaders will tell reporters about its results at a news conference.
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where it was suggested:
There will be no grand deal on Syria, Ukraine or Crimea. To my way of thinking all those claims presented by the always managing your perception media have been little more then unadulterated, Grade A, stinking piles of distractionary dung!
UPDATE July 17/2018:Transcript of the Putin/Trump press conference including Q & A afterwardsvia NPR