“I don't trust Putin”.
This is what Joe Biden, then a simple senator from Delaware, declared in June 2001 ... exactly 20 years ago after President George W. Bush, who had just met the Russian president in Slovenia, found him. "Very direct", and even "trustworthy" ...
Ten years later, having become Obama's vice-president, Biden had met Putin and had declared to him, eye to eye, he assures, "I don't think you have a soul" ... And quite recently, when a reporter asked him if he thought that "Putin was a killer (a
killer
)," he had said yes.
Why then did Joe Biden propose this summit meeting in Geneva, during a phone call in mid-April?
For the White House, it's simple, it's impossible to avoid dealing with Russia.
"This is not a reward for Putin," said Jake Sullivan, national security adviser.
We want to be able to look President Putin in the eye and tell him: these are the American expectations ”.
"Managing what will continue to be a difficult relationship"
Biden considers “Putin is a thug,” a former senior State Department official recently told Politico magazine.
"He sees him as a rational person, not interested in issues like human rights, a cold, hard, realistic man" ...
It is difficult in these conditions to imagine a harmonious tête-à-tête in Geneva on June 16, even if it will take place in the villa La Grange, an 18th century building located in the magnificent Parc des Eaux Vives and which enjoys a spectacular view of Lake Geneva.
The subjects of contention abound: accusations of Russian interference in the American elections, cyberattacks carried out by gangs apparently based in Russia against American companies, the fate of Alexey Navalny, the Russian opponent imprisoned for several months, the rumors Russian boots on the border with Ukraine, the lack of a nuclear stability agreement, Belarus, etc.
But above all, as he said a few days ago, Biden wants to make the fight against corruption in the world a priority and he accuses Russia of exporting corruption and using it as a weapon. against vulnerable societies everywhere.
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On the American side, we have deliberately set the bar very low. "We have no illusions, said a close friend of Biden, for us, this summit is an important tool to manage what will continue to be a difficult relationship."
