After Donald Trump’s meeting with Kim Jong-un, the US President has now held an another “colourful” dialogue with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. Despite the huge interest and traditionally high stakes, the two generated a meeting which is rich in a media content, but with rather little real implications.
As a recent tradition, Trump was the one whose behaviour was followed more strictly and who took the vast majority of the negative comments after the meeting. There is no way to be otherwise after he is the most untypical president in the White House for a quite some time.
“The meeting between him and Russian President Vladimir Putin is a slippery slope towards a darker world,” noted The Guardian, which described Trump as “a friend of dictators”. He “destroys alliances with democracies” while “enjoying authoritarian leaders”. It was again commented on the position of Trump that Crimea belongs to Russia and that Russia must be returned to the G7. The conclusion – he constantly takes Putin’s position against America’s own interests and its allies ones.
At home, US media also did not forget to come up with critical comments about their president. Trump faced a wave of criticism in the United States after protecting Russia against the accusations that the country has intervened in the 2016 elections. At the meeting in Finland, Trump denied the allegations of US intelligence services, saying Russia has no reason to intervene. Particularly critical was New York Daily News, which came out with provocative cartoon and accused Trump in betrayal.
In turn, Putin also did not break the well-known framework. He said none of his military officials intervened in any way in the US elections. Announced that Crimea is a closed chapter and even proposed to Americans to interrogate Russian officials about the alleged interference in the November 2016 elections – something that is difficult to be taken seriously.
At first sight, the end of the summit has actually given the world just what Putin wanted from the beginning – to be recognised by the man who should be the leader of the free world as a legitimate member of the club of the leading forces.
Most popular US and Western media scrutinized US President to a devastating level for his behaviour during the meeting. The truth is, however, that this meeting was not different from the historical handshake with Kim Jong-Un – a matter of protocol and food for the media than with real and lasting dimensions. If something is certain, it is that with both, Trump and Putin, that gap between what they say and what they do is often quite big.
