Trump-Putin summit: Why is it a big deal?
16 July 2018
The relations between the US and Russia have been far from smile-inducing recently
US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin are holding a summit in the Finnish capital, Helsinki. Why is this so hotly anticipated?
The US and Russia have long been adversaries but accusations that Moscow interfered in the US presidential election in 2016 have added an extra, bitter ingredient.
Let's take a look.
Why are there US-Russia tensions?
It goes back to the so-called Cold War (from 1945 to 1989) and the hostilities between the US and the then Soviet Union.
They never fought each other directly but differences remained even after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the consolidation of the US as the world's sole superpower.
Fast forward to now, and Mr Putin has made no secret of his determination to reassert Russian power after years of perceived humiliation, often putting his country on a collision course with the US.
How do Russia tensions compare to Soviet era?
Difficult at the best of times, bilateral relations have deteriorated significantly since Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. That led the US and others to impose a series of economic sanctions on Russia.
Why is a meeting between these men so important?
Their relationship has become one of the most scrutinised in global affairs, because of claims of Russian meddling in the 2016 US election, which has been denied by Moscow.
US intelligence agencies believe Russia tried to sway the election in Mr Trump's favour.
An investigation into what Russia did and whether any of the Trump team helped them is the subject of an investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, dismissed by the president as a "witch hunt".
Repeatedly he has called it a Democratic conspiracy driven by bitterness at losing the election.
Read more about Crimea
Trump Russia affair: Key questions answered
Since taking office in January 2017, President Trump has sought to improve ties, a stance at odds with traditional Republican party policy.
Last month, he supported Russia's re-admission to the group of industrialised nations - now called G7 - after its suspension following the annexation of Crimea.
What have they said about each other?
Mr Trump has made several comments praising Mr Putin. "Very much of a leader," he said in 2016, "far more than our president has been a leader," in reference to Barack Obama.
Last year, he called Mr Putin a "tough cookie".
In March, he congratulated Mr Putin for his controversial election victory, despite warnings from his advisers not to do so.
Putin and Trump in their own words
Mr Putin has been more guarded in his views about Mr Trump, but has called him a "very bright person, talented" and a "colourful" man in the past.
What will they discuss?
Official statements have lacked details but the talks are likely to include:
Arms control: Both leaders have bragged about their nuclear capabilities and experts say this is one of the key points to watch. US and Russia have a deal called New Start, aimed at reducing and limiting the size of their nuclear arsenals, the two largest in the world. It is in effect until 2021 and any progress in extending it will be seen as a good sign. They are also likely to discuss a missiles treaty signed in 1987 amid mutual accusations of breaches
US sanctions: Those were imposed on companies and individuals over Russia's annexation of Crimea, its support to separatists in eastern Ukraine, its role in the conflict in Syria and its alleged interference in the 2016 election. Congress needs to approve the easing of restrictions but observers say Mr Trump can indicate that the list of those sanctioned will not be expanded, a move that would be welcomed by Russia
Ukraine: The US has given military aid to Ukraine and Mr Putin would be happy to see it scrapped. This, as well as a recognition of Russia's annexation of Crimea, is unlikely to happen. But both leaders can agree to allow international peacekeepers to patrol eastern Ukraine, where a conflict has killed more than 10,000 people
Syria: Israel, a key US ally, wants to see Iran and Iranian-backed forces away from south-west Syria, in the area next to its border. Mr Trump is likely to raise the issue but analysts say it is not clear whether Mr Putin can make any offer that includes limiting Iran's activities in the country, for example
Why are Trump's allies worried?
During a summit with Nato countries last week, Mr Trump signed a joint statement condemning "Russian aggression".
The question many now ask is whether he will raise the concerns of the allies directly with the Russian president.
It has been widely reported that the European partners have not been briefed about what Mr Trump is really trying to achieve in Helsinki.
What is Nato?
Can Nato survive Trump?
There is a fear that after a tumultuous trip to Europe he will have some warm words for Mr Putin.
Mr Trump bashed Nato allies over their defence spending, said Germany was "controlled by Russia" because of its gas imports and criticised UK Prime Minister Theresa May's Brexit plan.
What to expect?
It's hard to say. Mr Trump's unorthodox approach to such talks makes any prediction look more like a guessing game, but US advisers have downplayed any chance of major announcements.
Adding an air of mystery is the fact that both will speak in private during their meeting, with only their interpreters expected to be present.
Mr Putin and Mr Trump have met before on the sidelines of summits
As a gesture of a restart in relations, they could agree to restore their countries' diplomatic presence after tit-for-tat expulsions in the last few years, most recently over the poisoning of a former Russian spy in England.
What does it mean for the rest of the world?
A lot. US and Russia have been in different, or even opposing sides on many critical issues - Syria, Ukraine, Crimea, to name a few - that have a global impact.
Add to that the Western sanctions in Russia that Mr Putin says are "harmful for everyone".
But European countries, perhaps more than others, will be watching it very closely. They are in an uncomfortable situation as they fear the Russian threat, but are to some degree dependent on Russian energy supplies.
Mr Trump singled out Germany over the controversial Nord Stream 2 project that will boost Russian gas deliveries to Central and Western Europe across the Baltic Sea. The route bypasses not only Ukraine but also the Baltic states and Poland - all of those countries oppose it.
This all leaves little doubt that the world will be watching to see what happens on Monday.
Monday, July 16, 2018
Putin arrives late for Helsinki summit with Trump - live updates - Guardian
Putin arrives late for Helsinki summit with Trump - live updates
US president Donald Trump says relations with Russia have ‘never been worse as he arrives in Helsinki for high-stakes summit with Vladimir Putin
LIVE Updated 3m ago
Matthew Weaver
Mon 16 Jul 2018 20.18 AEST First published on Mon 16 Jul 2018 17.07 AEST
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23m ago Putin arrives in Helsinki
1h ago Putin running late
7m ago
20:18
White House pool reporter Annie Karni, confirms that Trump has delayed leaving the Hilton Helsinki Kalastajatorppa, en route to the Presidential Palace.
He was due to depart at 12.40 local time (10.40 BST).
The hold up appears to be on Putin’s end as he has just this moment landed in Helsinki.
There has been no response from Trump’s press secretary Sarah Sanders when she was asked about the delay.
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11m ago
20:15
Putin briskly stepped off his plane, before being greeted on the tarmac. He took of his jacket and waved for the cameras. And then got into his huge new limo.
William Gallo
✔
@GalloVOA
· 25m
Replying to @GalloVOA
Putin is running a bit late, but he's arrived here in Helsinki. pic.twitter.com/JROj8ou7HT
William Gallo
✔
@GalloVOA
He's here: pic.twitter.com/WRGGzEkXNu
8:09 PM - Jul 16, 2018
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The Washington Post’s Philip Rucker reminds us that the summit was due to start at 1pm local time (11am BST).
Philip Rucker
✔
@PhilipRucker
Summit was set to begin 11 minutes ago, but leaders are not at the palace yet. It appears Putin is holding up Trump. Keeping people waiting is the Russian president’s MO to assert dominance.
8:12 PM - Jul 16, 2018
294
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11m ago
20:15
Since you’re here … we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading the Guardian than ever but advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. And unlike many news organisations, we haven’t put up a paywall – we want to keep our journalism as open as we can. So you can see why we need to ask for your help.
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16m ago
20:09
The diplomatic gamesmanship continues.
Kaitlan Collins
✔
@kaitlancollins
President Trump and Melania were scheduled to leave their hotel 26 minutes ago. Pool says they are still waiting, presumably on Putin.
Kaitlan Collins
✔
@kaitlancollins
Vladimir Putin — notorious for making people wait — still hasn’t landed in Helsinki. He’s supposed to have his official greeting with President Trump....in 17 minutes.
8:08 PM - Jul 16, 2018
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23m ago
20:03
Putin arrives in Helsinki
Vladimir Putin’s plane has touched down in the Helsinki almost an hour late.
View image on Twitter
View image on Twitter
William Gallo
✔
@GalloVOA
Replying to @GalloVOA
Putin is running a bit late, but he's arrived here in Helsinki.
8:01 PM - Jul 16, 2018
See William Gallo's other Tweets
Andrew Roth
@Andrew__Roth
Wondering how Donald Trump stacks up on being made to wait by Putin?Putin is current about 55 minutes late landing in Helsinki, taking him past Pope Francis (50 mins) and approaching Modi (1 hour). Things get bad at Lukashenka (3 hours) and Merkel (4 hours 15 min).
7:55 PM - Jul 16, 2018
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26m ago
20:00
Dmitry Peskov
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman says he hopes the summit will be a “baby step” toward fixing exceptionally bad US-Russian relations, AP reports.
Ahead of Monday’s meeting, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told broadcaster RT that the men had no strict agenda but recognize their “special responsibility” for global stability.
He said European countries shouldn’t be worried about a possible US-Russian rapprochement or decisions about Europe made “over the heads of Europeans.”
Peskov said the Russian leader respects Trump’s “America first” stance because Putin puts Russia first, but said the only way to make progress at the summit is if both sides are open to finding areas of mutual benefit.
Russian officials say Putin is expected to reiterate denials of meddling in the 2016 US presidential campaign.
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30m ago
19:56
Andrew Roth
President of Russia Vladimir Putin touches the World Cup trophy after the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia Final
President of Russia Vladimir Putin touches the World Cup trophy after the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia Final Photograph: Chris Brunskill/Fantasista/Getty Images
The United States is not the only side complaining about cyberattacks ahead of Monday’s summit.
Vladimir Putin told law enforcement officials on Sunday evening that the country had seen a sharp rise in cyberattacks during the World Cup as he thanked Russian law enforcement in person for providing security during the tournament.
“Almost 25 million cyberattacks and other situations of criminal impact on the Russian information infrastructure associated with the organization of the World Cup were neutralized during the championship,” Putin said In Moscow on Sunday evening. The remarks were reported on Monday morning.
Russian officials have pushed the idea of a joint agreement on cybersecurity with the United States for several years. Putin will likely use that fact as a defence when Trump asks about Russia’s election meddling during the 2016 elections, which he said he would “certainly” do in a television interview.
Russia would like an agreement on “informational security,” and includes limits on content that may be objectionable to governments.
That may permit countries to eliminate content from social media sites like Facebook or Twitter that call for protests.
The United States has traditionally defined the issue more closely as cybersecurity, which concerns the use of hacking technology but not content on social media.
Updated at 7.56pm AEST
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33m ago
19:52
Andrew Roth
Putin’s trip to Helsinki marks the first foreign trip for the Russian president’s new Cortege limousine, which was unveiled with great fanfare at his inauguration in May.
The Kremlin pool reporter for Komsomolskaya Pravda, Dmitry Smirnov, snapped a picture of the limousine at Helsinki’s airport where Putin is expected to land more than 45 minutes late.
Дмитрий Смирнов
✔
@dimsmirnov175
Первый зарубежный выезд «Кортежа»: Лимузин ждет Путина в аэропорту Хельсинки
7:32 PM - Jul 16, 2018
The Kremlin pool arrived earlier in a separate plan and have some time on their hands.
At Putin’s inauguration, the limousine drove him about 200m from the Kremlin’s Senate Building to the Andreevsky Hall.
Monday’s route will be slightly more arduous, usually about a 25-minute ride to the city’s Presidential Palace where he will meet one-on-one with Trump.
He has also shown off the limousine to the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed.
The domestically produced luxury car was a point of pride for Putin, who used a Mercedes until this year. The state news agency Sputnik wrote that the car was the first domestically produced limousine for a head of state since Mikhail Gorbachev’s Zil-41052 in 1985.
36m ago
19:50
Putin’s lateness is being interpreted as diplomatic gamesmanship. Speaking to CNN while we still wait for Putin’s plane to land in Helsinki, Thomas Pickering, former US ambassador to the UN, said:
Obviously the lateness is something he could have avoided, so it has some intent. That intent obviously is in some ways to level the playing field of publicity about this meeting so that it isn’t all Trump, whatever he’s saying.
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50m ago
19:36
Newspaper billboards in Helsinki attack the record of both Putin and Trump on free speech.
Huff Post UK reports:
Helsingin Sanomat, one of the country’s top news outlets, unveiled nearly 300 billboards calling out the leaders’ respective records of rocky relations with the media. The billboards were placed along the leaders’ route to the summit.
Aside from the welcome billboard which reads “Mr. President, Welcome to the Land of Free Press,” most of the others feature headlines published in the newspaper over the years, according to a press release.
“The headlines highlight the presidents’ turbulent relations with the media and were published between the years 2000 and 2018,” the statement said.
Editor-in-chief Kaius Nieme also explained that the banners are intended as a display of support for “colleagues who have to fight in ever toughening circumstances on a daily basis both in the U.S. and Russia,” noting that both countries sit pretty far down on the 2018 World Press Freedom Index. Russia is ranked 148 and the U.S. sits at 45. Finland is ranked fourth.
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1h ago
19:27
Putin running late
Putin already has the edge in pre-summit posturing by keeping Trump waiting. His plane to Helsinki is reported to be running late.
Norah O'Donnell🇺🇸
✔
@NorahODonnell
Looks like Putin will keep Trump waiting. He’s landing about 45 minutes late at 5:47 EST, just about the time he was supposed to be arriving at the Presidential Palace. #HelsinkiSummit
7:03 PM - Jul 16, 2018
1h ago
19:19
European Council president Donald Tusk has suggested that Trump is spreading fake news by telling CBS that the European Union is a foe of the US.
Donald Tusk
(@eucopresident)
America and the EU are best friends. Whoever says we are foes is spreading fake news.
July 15, 2018
1:26
Donald Trump calls the EU a foe during interview in Scotland - video
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1h ago
19:14
Trump is confident of getting on with Putin, he told Piers Morgan for ITV’s Good Morning Britain on board air force one.
Trump accepted that Putin “probably is” a ruthless person, but couldn’t tell yet.
Good Morning Britain quoted him saying: “I don’t know him… I met him a couple of times… I think we could probably get along very well”
Good Morning Britain
✔
@GMB
'I don’t know him… I met him a couple of times… I think we could probably get along very well'
President Trump confessed to @GMB he didn’t know Vladimir Putin well.
3:24 PM - Jul 16, 2018
101
63 people are talking about this
US president Donald Trump says relations with Russia have ‘never been worse as he arrives in Helsinki for high-stakes summit with Vladimir Putin
LIVE Updated 3m ago
Matthew Weaver
Mon 16 Jul 2018 20.18 AEST First published on Mon 16 Jul 2018 17.07 AEST
Shares
125
Comments
1,575
23m ago Putin arrives in Helsinki
1h ago Putin running late
7m ago
20:18
White House pool reporter Annie Karni, confirms that Trump has delayed leaving the Hilton Helsinki Kalastajatorppa, en route to the Presidential Palace.
He was due to depart at 12.40 local time (10.40 BST).
The hold up appears to be on Putin’s end as he has just this moment landed in Helsinki.
There has been no response from Trump’s press secretary Sarah Sanders when she was asked about the delay.
Facebook Twitter Google plus
11m ago
20:15
Putin briskly stepped off his plane, before being greeted on the tarmac. He took of his jacket and waved for the cameras. And then got into his huge new limo.
William Gallo
✔
@GalloVOA
· 25m
Replying to @GalloVOA
Putin is running a bit late, but he's arrived here in Helsinki. pic.twitter.com/JROj8ou7HT
William Gallo
✔
@GalloVOA
He's here: pic.twitter.com/WRGGzEkXNu
8:09 PM - Jul 16, 2018
View image on Twitter
See William Gallo's other Tweets
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The Washington Post’s Philip Rucker reminds us that the summit was due to start at 1pm local time (11am BST).
Philip Rucker
✔
@PhilipRucker
Summit was set to begin 11 minutes ago, but leaders are not at the palace yet. It appears Putin is holding up Trump. Keeping people waiting is the Russian president’s MO to assert dominance.
8:12 PM - Jul 16, 2018
294
190 people are talking about this
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11m ago
20:15
Since you’re here … we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading the Guardian than ever but advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. And unlike many news organisations, we haven’t put up a paywall – we want to keep our journalism as open as we can. So you can see why we need to ask for your help.
If everyone who reads our reporting, who likes it, helps fund it, our future would be much more secure. For as little as $1, you can support the Guardian – and it only takes a minute. Make a contribution. - Guardian HQ
16m ago
20:09
The diplomatic gamesmanship continues.
Kaitlan Collins
✔
@kaitlancollins
President Trump and Melania were scheduled to leave their hotel 26 minutes ago. Pool says they are still waiting, presumably on Putin.
Kaitlan Collins
✔
@kaitlancollins
Vladimir Putin — notorious for making people wait — still hasn’t landed in Helsinki. He’s supposed to have his official greeting with President Trump....in 17 minutes.
8:08 PM - Jul 16, 2018
49
35 people are talking about this
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23m ago
20:03
Putin arrives in Helsinki
Vladimir Putin’s plane has touched down in the Helsinki almost an hour late.
View image on Twitter
View image on Twitter
William Gallo
✔
@GalloVOA
Replying to @GalloVOA
Putin is running a bit late, but he's arrived here in Helsinki.
8:01 PM - Jul 16, 2018
See William Gallo's other Tweets
Andrew Roth
@Andrew__Roth
Wondering how Donald Trump stacks up on being made to wait by Putin?Putin is current about 55 minutes late landing in Helsinki, taking him past Pope Francis (50 mins) and approaching Modi (1 hour). Things get bad at Lukashenka (3 hours) and Merkel (4 hours 15 min).
7:55 PM - Jul 16, 2018
Facebook Twitter Google plus
26m ago
20:00
Dmitry Peskov
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman says he hopes the summit will be a “baby step” toward fixing exceptionally bad US-Russian relations, AP reports.
Ahead of Monday’s meeting, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told broadcaster RT that the men had no strict agenda but recognize their “special responsibility” for global stability.
He said European countries shouldn’t be worried about a possible US-Russian rapprochement or decisions about Europe made “over the heads of Europeans.”
Peskov said the Russian leader respects Trump’s “America first” stance because Putin puts Russia first, but said the only way to make progress at the summit is if both sides are open to finding areas of mutual benefit.
Russian officials say Putin is expected to reiterate denials of meddling in the 2016 US presidential campaign.
Facebook Twitter Google plus
30m ago
19:56
Andrew Roth
President of Russia Vladimir Putin touches the World Cup trophy after the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia Final
President of Russia Vladimir Putin touches the World Cup trophy after the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia Final Photograph: Chris Brunskill/Fantasista/Getty Images
The United States is not the only side complaining about cyberattacks ahead of Monday’s summit.
Vladimir Putin told law enforcement officials on Sunday evening that the country had seen a sharp rise in cyberattacks during the World Cup as he thanked Russian law enforcement in person for providing security during the tournament.
“Almost 25 million cyberattacks and other situations of criminal impact on the Russian information infrastructure associated with the organization of the World Cup were neutralized during the championship,” Putin said In Moscow on Sunday evening. The remarks were reported on Monday morning.
Russian officials have pushed the idea of a joint agreement on cybersecurity with the United States for several years. Putin will likely use that fact as a defence when Trump asks about Russia’s election meddling during the 2016 elections, which he said he would “certainly” do in a television interview.
Russia would like an agreement on “informational security,” and includes limits on content that may be objectionable to governments.
That may permit countries to eliminate content from social media sites like Facebook or Twitter that call for protests.
The United States has traditionally defined the issue more closely as cybersecurity, which concerns the use of hacking technology but not content on social media.
Updated at 7.56pm AEST
Facebook Twitter Google plus
33m ago
19:52
Andrew Roth
Putin’s trip to Helsinki marks the first foreign trip for the Russian president’s new Cortege limousine, which was unveiled with great fanfare at his inauguration in May.
The Kremlin pool reporter for Komsomolskaya Pravda, Dmitry Smirnov, snapped a picture of the limousine at Helsinki’s airport where Putin is expected to land more than 45 minutes late.
Дмитрий Смирнов
✔
@dimsmirnov175
Первый зарубежный выезд «Кортежа»: Лимузин ждет Путина в аэропорту Хельсинки
7:32 PM - Jul 16, 2018
The Kremlin pool arrived earlier in a separate plan and have some time on their hands.
At Putin’s inauguration, the limousine drove him about 200m from the Kremlin’s Senate Building to the Andreevsky Hall.
Monday’s route will be slightly more arduous, usually about a 25-minute ride to the city’s Presidential Palace where he will meet one-on-one with Trump.
He has also shown off the limousine to the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed.
The domestically produced luxury car was a point of pride for Putin, who used a Mercedes until this year. The state news agency Sputnik wrote that the car was the first domestically produced limousine for a head of state since Mikhail Gorbachev’s Zil-41052 in 1985.
36m ago
19:50
Putin’s lateness is being interpreted as diplomatic gamesmanship. Speaking to CNN while we still wait for Putin’s plane to land in Helsinki, Thomas Pickering, former US ambassador to the UN, said:
Obviously the lateness is something he could have avoided, so it has some intent. That intent obviously is in some ways to level the playing field of publicity about this meeting so that it isn’t all Trump, whatever he’s saying.
Facebook Twitter Google plus
50m ago
19:36
Newspaper billboards in Helsinki attack the record of both Putin and Trump on free speech.
Huff Post UK reports:
Helsingin Sanomat, one of the country’s top news outlets, unveiled nearly 300 billboards calling out the leaders’ respective records of rocky relations with the media. The billboards were placed along the leaders’ route to the summit.
Aside from the welcome billboard which reads “Mr. President, Welcome to the Land of Free Press,” most of the others feature headlines published in the newspaper over the years, according to a press release.
“The headlines highlight the presidents’ turbulent relations with the media and were published between the years 2000 and 2018,” the statement said.
Editor-in-chief Kaius Nieme also explained that the banners are intended as a display of support for “colleagues who have to fight in ever toughening circumstances on a daily basis both in the U.S. and Russia,” noting that both countries sit pretty far down on the 2018 World Press Freedom Index. Russia is ranked 148 and the U.S. sits at 45. Finland is ranked fourth.
Facebook Twitter Google plus
1h ago
19:27
Putin running late
Putin already has the edge in pre-summit posturing by keeping Trump waiting. His plane to Helsinki is reported to be running late.
Norah O'Donnell🇺🇸
✔
@NorahODonnell
Looks like Putin will keep Trump waiting. He’s landing about 45 minutes late at 5:47 EST, just about the time he was supposed to be arriving at the Presidential Palace. #HelsinkiSummit
7:03 PM - Jul 16, 2018
1h ago
19:19
European Council president Donald Tusk has suggested that Trump is spreading fake news by telling CBS that the European Union is a foe of the US.
Donald Tusk
(@eucopresident)
America and the EU are best friends. Whoever says we are foes is spreading fake news.
July 15, 2018
1:26
Donald Trump calls the EU a foe during interview in Scotland - video
Facebook Twitter Google plus
1h ago
19:14
Trump is confident of getting on with Putin, he told Piers Morgan for ITV’s Good Morning Britain on board air force one.
Trump accepted that Putin “probably is” a ruthless person, but couldn’t tell yet.
Good Morning Britain quoted him saying: “I don’t know him… I met him a couple of times… I think we could probably get along very well”
Good Morning Britain
✔
@GMB
'I don’t know him… I met him a couple of times… I think we could probably get along very well'
President Trump confessed to @GMB he didn’t know Vladimir Putin well.
3:24 PM - Jul 16, 2018
101
63 people are talking about this
Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin summit: Everything you need to know - Daily Mail
Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin summit: Everything you need to know
Donald Trump will head to Helsinki, Finland for a summit with Vladimir Putin
Trump is expected to question Putin over the presidential election meddling
Syria's Bashar al-Assad and annexation of Crimea in Ukraine may be discussed
By MADHVI MAVADIYA
PUBLISHED: 05:17 AEST, 14 July 2018 | UPDATED: 05:17 AEST, 14 July 2018
After Donald Trump’s sojourn in Scotland, the US President is expected to head to Helsinki, Finland where he and Vladimir Putin will hold their first official summit since he was inaugurated in hopes to strike a ‘peace deal’.
Reports have revealed that Trump may question the Russian President about the 2016 presidential election meddling, as well as discuss conflicts in Syria and Ukraine and sanctions that have been imposed by both countries against each other.
At a joint press conference with Theresa May, Trump said that he had been ‘tougher on Russia than anybody. We have been extremely tough on Russia.’
President Donald Trump meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the G20 Summit +2
President Donald Trump meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the G20 Summit
He then went on to mention how 60 intelligence officers were expelled from the Russian embassy in Washington in response to the nerve agent attack on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia Skripal.
Speaking to reporters at Chequers, Trump spoke about how Russia have denied any involvement in the attack and Putin is expected to do the same at the Helsinki summit when the 2016 election is discussed in relation to the country’s influence against Hillary Clinton.
‘I’m not going in with high expectations but we may come out with very surprising things,’ Trump said, and added that building a relationship with the Russian President was his priority, because it would be ‘good for Russia, good for everybody’.
‘That would be a tremendous achievement if we could do something on nuclear proliferation,’ he said. May highlighted that Trump would be entering a negotiation with the 29-strong NATO military alliance united behind him.
May said: ‘We agree that it is important to engage Russia from a position of strength and unity and that we should continue to deter and counter all efforts to undermine our democracies.’
Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump talk during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit +2
Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump talk during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit
Here’s everything you need to know about the summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.
When is the Trump Putin summit in Helsinki?
The Helsinki summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin will be held in Finland’s capital on July 16, 2018, as has been announced by the White House and Kremlin.
What will be discussed during the Helsinki summit?
While the main topics of conversation will be foreign policy and Russian interference in 2016 as Vice President Mike Pence confirmed, other subjects such as Russia’s support of the regime of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad and the 2014 annexation of Crimea region of Ukraine may also be discussed, as reported in Time.
Pence said: ‘There are a broad range of issues the President’s going to talk about that need to be addressed.’ He added that this would include the ‘economic relationship with the United States and Russia and countries of the world'.
When questioned whether or not this discussion of the relationship between countries would include election meddling, Pence said: ‘I think there will be a lot of stuff that comes up. He’s discussed that with President Putin before. I would anticipate that he will discuss that with him again.’
Unlike Trump, Putin does not need a big deal out of this meeting in order to feel as if the summit has been a success, as is explained in RFE/RL. Analysis in the Russian newspaper Vedomosti echoed these claims.
‘For Putin, everything that is not a clear failure will seem like a success, while for Trump everything that's not an obvious victory will be interpreted by his critics as a failure, so there will be no firm commitments.
‘Of course, we cannot expect breakthroughs like at the meeting of the heads of the U.S.A. and U.S.S.R. in Reykjavik in 1986 (and Putin and Trump are not Gorbachev and Reagan),’ the article read. Trump will need to identify whether or not Russia is misbehaving, while also thawing tensions.
With American relations with Russia being as strained since the Cold War, both Presidents will need to ensure that they are on the same page, especially when it comes to speaking about nuclear arsenals and arms control.
This will be the third face-to-face meeting between the world leaders but the first full summit. Trump and Putin first met at the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany and the second was in Vietnam during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit.
By repeatedly denying that Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election was an attempt to delegitimize him, Trump has tried to thaw tensions between both countries on Twitter.
‘Russia continues to say they had nothing to do with Meddling in our Election! Where is the DNC Server, and why didn’t Shady James Comey and the now disgraced FBI agents take and closely examine it? Why isn’t Hillary/Russia being looked at? So many questions, so much corruption!,’ Trump tweeted.
Donald J. Trump
✔
@realDonaldTrump
Russia continues to say they had nothing to do with Meddling in our Election! Where is the DNC Server, and why didn’t Shady James Comey and the now disgraced FBI agents take and closely examine it? Why isn’t Hillary/Russia being looked at? So many questions, so much corruption!
9:25 PM - Jun 28, 2018
Donald Trump will head to Helsinki, Finland for a summit with Vladimir Putin
Trump is expected to question Putin over the presidential election meddling
Syria's Bashar al-Assad and annexation of Crimea in Ukraine may be discussed
By MADHVI MAVADIYA
PUBLISHED: 05:17 AEST, 14 July 2018 | UPDATED: 05:17 AEST, 14 July 2018
After Donald Trump’s sojourn in Scotland, the US President is expected to head to Helsinki, Finland where he and Vladimir Putin will hold their first official summit since he was inaugurated in hopes to strike a ‘peace deal’.
Reports have revealed that Trump may question the Russian President about the 2016 presidential election meddling, as well as discuss conflicts in Syria and Ukraine and sanctions that have been imposed by both countries against each other.
At a joint press conference with Theresa May, Trump said that he had been ‘tougher on Russia than anybody. We have been extremely tough on Russia.’
President Donald Trump meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the G20 Summit +2
President Donald Trump meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the G20 Summit
He then went on to mention how 60 intelligence officers were expelled from the Russian embassy in Washington in response to the nerve agent attack on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia Skripal.
Speaking to reporters at Chequers, Trump spoke about how Russia have denied any involvement in the attack and Putin is expected to do the same at the Helsinki summit when the 2016 election is discussed in relation to the country’s influence against Hillary Clinton.
‘I’m not going in with high expectations but we may come out with very surprising things,’ Trump said, and added that building a relationship with the Russian President was his priority, because it would be ‘good for Russia, good for everybody’.
‘That would be a tremendous achievement if we could do something on nuclear proliferation,’ he said. May highlighted that Trump would be entering a negotiation with the 29-strong NATO military alliance united behind him.
May said: ‘We agree that it is important to engage Russia from a position of strength and unity and that we should continue to deter and counter all efforts to undermine our democracies.’
Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump talk during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit +2
Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump talk during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit
Here’s everything you need to know about the summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.
When is the Trump Putin summit in Helsinki?
The Helsinki summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin will be held in Finland’s capital on July 16, 2018, as has been announced by the White House and Kremlin.
What will be discussed during the Helsinki summit?
While the main topics of conversation will be foreign policy and Russian interference in 2016 as Vice President Mike Pence confirmed, other subjects such as Russia’s support of the regime of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad and the 2014 annexation of Crimea region of Ukraine may also be discussed, as reported in Time.
Pence said: ‘There are a broad range of issues the President’s going to talk about that need to be addressed.’ He added that this would include the ‘economic relationship with the United States and Russia and countries of the world'.
When questioned whether or not this discussion of the relationship between countries would include election meddling, Pence said: ‘I think there will be a lot of stuff that comes up. He’s discussed that with President Putin before. I would anticipate that he will discuss that with him again.’
Unlike Trump, Putin does not need a big deal out of this meeting in order to feel as if the summit has been a success, as is explained in RFE/RL. Analysis in the Russian newspaper Vedomosti echoed these claims.
‘For Putin, everything that is not a clear failure will seem like a success, while for Trump everything that's not an obvious victory will be interpreted by his critics as a failure, so there will be no firm commitments.
‘Of course, we cannot expect breakthroughs like at the meeting of the heads of the U.S.A. and U.S.S.R. in Reykjavik in 1986 (and Putin and Trump are not Gorbachev and Reagan),’ the article read. Trump will need to identify whether or not Russia is misbehaving, while also thawing tensions.
With American relations with Russia being as strained since the Cold War, both Presidents will need to ensure that they are on the same page, especially when it comes to speaking about nuclear arsenals and arms control.
This will be the third face-to-face meeting between the world leaders but the first full summit. Trump and Putin first met at the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany and the second was in Vietnam during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit.
By repeatedly denying that Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election was an attempt to delegitimize him, Trump has tried to thaw tensions between both countries on Twitter.
‘Russia continues to say they had nothing to do with Meddling in our Election! Where is the DNC Server, and why didn’t Shady James Comey and the now disgraced FBI agents take and closely examine it? Why isn’t Hillary/Russia being looked at? So many questions, so much corruption!,’ Trump tweeted.
Donald J. Trump
✔
@realDonaldTrump
Russia continues to say they had nothing to do with Meddling in our Election! Where is the DNC Server, and why didn’t Shady James Comey and the now disgraced FBI agents take and closely examine it? Why isn’t Hillary/Russia being looked at? So many questions, so much corruption!
9:25 PM - Jun 28, 2018
U.K. Poisoning Inquiry Turns to Russian Agency in Mueller Indictments - New York Times
U.K. Poisoning Inquiry Turns to Russian Agency in Mueller Indictments
Investigators in Salisbury, England, inspecting a shopping district in April near where the former Russian spy Sergei V. Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, were found critically ill the previous month. Suspicions have turned toward current or former agents of a Russian military intelligence service.
By Ellen Barry, Michael Schwirtz and Eric Schmitt
July 15, 2018
LONDON — The same Russian military intelligence service now accused of disrupting the 2016 presidential election in America may also be responsible for the nerve agent attack in Britain against a former Russian spy — an audacious poisoning that led to a geopolitical confrontation this spring between Moscow and the West.
British investigators believe the March 4 attack on the former spy, Sergei V. Skripal, and his daughter, Yulia, was most probably carried out by current or former agents of the service, known as the G.R.U., who were sent to his home in southern England, according to one British official, one American official and one former American official familiar with the inquiry, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence.
British officials are now closing in on identifying the individuals they believe carried out the operation, said the former American official. At the same time, investigators have not ruled out the possibility that another Russian intelligence agency, or a privatized spinoff, could be responsible.
President Trump and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia are to hold a much-scrutinized meeting on Monday in Helsinki, Finland. For months, Mr. Trump has angrily belittled the special counsel investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election. But on Friday, the Justice Department announced a bombshell indictment of 12 G.R.U. officers in the hacking of internal communications of the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton presidential campaign.
The indictment by Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel, detailed a sophisticated operation, intended to disrupt America’s democratic process, carried out by a Russian military intelligence service few Americans know about. But analysts and government officials say the G.R.U., now known as the Main Directorate of the General Staff, serves as an undercover strike force for the Kremlin in conflicts around the world.
The agency has been linked to Russia’s hybrid war in Ukraine, as well as the annexation of Crimea in 2014. It has been involved in the seizing of Syrian cities on behalf of President Bashar al-Assad. In more peaceful regions, the G.R.U. is accused of creating political turmoil, mobilizing Slavic nationalists in Montenegro and funding protests to try to prevent Macedonia’s recent name change.
The poisoning of Mr. Skripal and his daughter with a military grade nerve agent is a different type of operation, one that falls into the tradition of Russian and Soviet intelligence practices toward traitors. Mr. Skripal served in the G.R.U. for about 15 years but also worked as an informant for MI6, Britain’s foreign intelligence service — a rare betrayal among G.R.U. officers, and one that most likely required laborious effort to mitigate damage to the agency’s networks.
Russian officials have denied their country’s involvement in the poisoning of the Skripals, even as their British counterparts have accused the Kremlin of ordering the attack.
Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, left, and his deputy Edward O’Callaghan at a news conference to announce indictments against 12 Russian military officers who are accused of conspiring to interfere with the 2016 presidential election.CreditT.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York Times
On Sunday, Dmitri S. Peskov, a spokesman for Mr. Putin, dismissed the involvement of the G.R.U. “Russia is in no way involved in this episode,” he said. “We consider this whole thing a major provocation.”
The British investigation seems to be progressing steadily, said Mark Galeotti, an expert on Russian intelligence services at the Institute of International Relations Prague.
“They have a pretty good sense of when these people traveled, they’re going to be doing the full thing of checking the face of everyone on the plane, given that this is the land of CCTV,” Mr. Galeotti said, referring to Britain. “At the very least, they have grainy photographs from CCTV of the people they assume were involved.”
He added that the conclusions of the inquiry would have little impact on the military intelligence service.
“From the G.R.U. point of view, what really matters is the opinion of one man,” he said, “and he already knows what they did or didn’t do.”
Relations between Britain and Russia are now deeply strained. In April, Britain and many of its allies, including the United States, expelled more than 150 Russian diplomats — many of them officers with the G.R.U. — as a protest against the poisoning. Russia retaliated with its own expulsions.
Before ordering the expulsions, Britain privately presented its case against Russia to other governments, including evidence that G.R.U. cyberspecialists had hacked the email accounts of Mr. Skripal’s daughter in 2013. Both Mr. Skripal and his daughter were under surveillance before the attack, and her phone was possibly infected with malware to track her whereabouts, the BBC reported this month.
Mr. Skripal’s final post with the G.R.U. was as a high-level personnel administrator, providing him with extensive knowledge of operations and individual agents. He was arrested in Russia in 2004 and later pleaded guilty to espionage, serving six years of a 13-year sentence before he was released in 2010 as part of a spy swap with the United States.
Mr. Skripal was living in Salisbury, England, before the poisoning attack. He and his daughter, who was visiting him from Russia at the time, have since recovered and are living in hiding. The crime’s repercussions continued last week with the death of a 44-year-old British citizen, Dawn Sturgess, who, the police say, most likely accidentally touched residue of the nerve agent used in the attack.
Investigators removing the bench around which the Skripals were found in Salisbury, England, in March.CreditWill Oliver/EPA, via Shutterstock
From the earliest days of the Skripal investigation, the G.R.U. was a suspect, in part because harsh punishment for traitors is part of the agency’s doctrine.
Viktor B. Suvorov, a G.R.U. officer who defected to Britain in 1978, wrote in a memoir that inductees were shown a gruesome film of a defector, strapped to a stretcher, being slowly rolled into a furnace and burned alive. Though his account was disputed by some of his countrymen, it is beyond doubt that G.R.U. defections were rare.
“Once you’re a member of an elite military force like the G.R.U., there is no leaving it,” said Nigel West, a British intelligence historian who has chronicled the lives of many defectors. “They do not defect. G.R.U. are a military, disciplined elite. They know the consequences.”
During the Soviet era, intelligence services had a protocol around assassinations of agents who betrayed their services. It began with a trial, and the sentencing of the traitor to death in absentia. Then the decision would be distributed to counterintelligence officers stationed at Soviet embassies.
A declassified C.I.A. document from 1964 describes K.G.B. assassination teams known as “combat groups,” which consisted of local agents or undercover “illegal staff” stationed all over the world in preparation for killings, known as “wet jobs.” Rather than carrying out the assassination, agents would often use the sentence as leverage to persuade the individual to become a double agent.
In recent years, the Kremlin has steered clear of direct involvement in criminal acts, preferring hybrid operations that cannot be traced to the government, sometimes carried out by retired operatives like the Russian “volunteers” fighting in Ukraine and Syria, who are often veterans of the G.R.U. special forces.
“Our country has come to the understanding that the government should not be committing crimes,” said Dmitri A. Muratov, director of the editorial board at Novaya Gazeta, an independent newspaper that reports on the security services. Hybrid formations, he said, “are close to the government but not of the government.”
He added, “These formations have infiltrated the political life of the country.”
Russian authorities have never disclosed the extent of the damage Mr. Skripal caused the G.R.U., but there are indications it was significant. In “The Devil’s Counterintelligence Dozen,” a book about Mr. Skripal’s years as a British spy, a Russian espionage expert, Nikolai Luzan, writes that the agent might have compromised as many as 300 Russian intelligence officers.
“When a mole is uncovered in any service, you have a massive operation to nail down everything he had access to,” said Mr. Galeotti, the author of “Spetsnaz,” a book about G.R.U. special forces, adding that many colleagues who worked closely with Mr. Skripal would most likely have had their careers ended as part of the sweep.
People leaving the Russian Embassy in London in March after Britain announced the expulsion of Russian diplomats over the use of a nerve agent on British soil.CreditDaniel Leal-Olivas/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
“If people defected earlier in their career, you might find an entire graduating class benched,” he said.
Even after the swap, he was able to damage the G.R.U.’s infrastructure. In 2012, he visited intelligence officers in the Czech Republic who had long felt vulnerable in the face of Russia’s unusually large intelligence presence in the country. Mr. Skripal, who stayed for a long, boozy lunch, was able to help, said a European official.
“In fact, Skripal was able to describe what types of operations they had, how they cover up their people, how they build their teams,” the official said. “He didn’t have to be concrete, to give up concrete names. It contributed to improving our work.”
Over the months that followed, a number of Russian diplomats were expelled from the Czech Republic on suspicion of spying. Mr. Skripal “may have contributed some part of the puzzle” that led to the expulsions, the official said. “Whether he caused them, nobody can tell you.”
In interviews, several former Russian intelligence agents were skeptical that the G.R.U. was behind the attack on the Skripals, in part because of its audacity.
In Soviet times, their more cosmopolitan K.G.B. colleagues referred to G.R.U. officers as “sapogi,” or boots, suggesting that they were tough and rugged but not sophisticated in their methods, said Yuri B. Shvets, a former K.G.B. agent posted to Washington in the 1980s.
“The G.R.U. took its officers from the trenches,” he said, unlike the K.G.B., which recruited from top universities.
Irek Murtazin, who worked closely with the G.R.U. and now covers military affairs for Novaya Gazeta, said that the agency’s assassinations tended to be unshowy affairs.
“He would have died from a heart attack or a stroke, a car would have run him over or a bum would have beat him up,” Mr. Murtazin said. “There wouldn’t have been any Novichok.”
Assassinations, nonetheless, have long been part of Russian and Soviet intelligence practice, Mr. Galeotti said. “That the G.R.U. kills people abroad has been amply demonstrated in a variety of other cases,” he said. “The G.R.U. tends to be more of a kinetic agency — more a bullet in the head rather than an exotic poison. The ultimate point is, from the G.R.U. point of view, it’s the outcomes that matter.”
Follow Ellen Barry, Michael Schwirtz and Eric Schmitt on Twitter: @EllenBarryNYT, @mschwirtz and @EricSchmittNYT.
Ellen Barry reported from London, Michael Schwirtz from Moscow, and Eric Schmitt from Washington.
Investigators in Salisbury, England, inspecting a shopping district in April near where the former Russian spy Sergei V. Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, were found critically ill the previous month. Suspicions have turned toward current or former agents of a Russian military intelligence service.
By Ellen Barry, Michael Schwirtz and Eric Schmitt
July 15, 2018
LONDON — The same Russian military intelligence service now accused of disrupting the 2016 presidential election in America may also be responsible for the nerve agent attack in Britain against a former Russian spy — an audacious poisoning that led to a geopolitical confrontation this spring between Moscow and the West.
British investigators believe the March 4 attack on the former spy, Sergei V. Skripal, and his daughter, Yulia, was most probably carried out by current or former agents of the service, known as the G.R.U., who were sent to his home in southern England, according to one British official, one American official and one former American official familiar with the inquiry, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence.
British officials are now closing in on identifying the individuals they believe carried out the operation, said the former American official. At the same time, investigators have not ruled out the possibility that another Russian intelligence agency, or a privatized spinoff, could be responsible.
President Trump and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia are to hold a much-scrutinized meeting on Monday in Helsinki, Finland. For months, Mr. Trump has angrily belittled the special counsel investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election. But on Friday, the Justice Department announced a bombshell indictment of 12 G.R.U. officers in the hacking of internal communications of the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton presidential campaign.
The indictment by Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel, detailed a sophisticated operation, intended to disrupt America’s democratic process, carried out by a Russian military intelligence service few Americans know about. But analysts and government officials say the G.R.U., now known as the Main Directorate of the General Staff, serves as an undercover strike force for the Kremlin in conflicts around the world.
The agency has been linked to Russia’s hybrid war in Ukraine, as well as the annexation of Crimea in 2014. It has been involved in the seizing of Syrian cities on behalf of President Bashar al-Assad. In more peaceful regions, the G.R.U. is accused of creating political turmoil, mobilizing Slavic nationalists in Montenegro and funding protests to try to prevent Macedonia’s recent name change.
The poisoning of Mr. Skripal and his daughter with a military grade nerve agent is a different type of operation, one that falls into the tradition of Russian and Soviet intelligence practices toward traitors. Mr. Skripal served in the G.R.U. for about 15 years but also worked as an informant for MI6, Britain’s foreign intelligence service — a rare betrayal among G.R.U. officers, and one that most likely required laborious effort to mitigate damage to the agency’s networks.
Russian officials have denied their country’s involvement in the poisoning of the Skripals, even as their British counterparts have accused the Kremlin of ordering the attack.
Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, left, and his deputy Edward O’Callaghan at a news conference to announce indictments against 12 Russian military officers who are accused of conspiring to interfere with the 2016 presidential election.CreditT.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York Times
On Sunday, Dmitri S. Peskov, a spokesman for Mr. Putin, dismissed the involvement of the G.R.U. “Russia is in no way involved in this episode,” he said. “We consider this whole thing a major provocation.”
The British investigation seems to be progressing steadily, said Mark Galeotti, an expert on Russian intelligence services at the Institute of International Relations Prague.
“They have a pretty good sense of when these people traveled, they’re going to be doing the full thing of checking the face of everyone on the plane, given that this is the land of CCTV,” Mr. Galeotti said, referring to Britain. “At the very least, they have grainy photographs from CCTV of the people they assume were involved.”
He added that the conclusions of the inquiry would have little impact on the military intelligence service.
“From the G.R.U. point of view, what really matters is the opinion of one man,” he said, “and he already knows what they did or didn’t do.”
Relations between Britain and Russia are now deeply strained. In April, Britain and many of its allies, including the United States, expelled more than 150 Russian diplomats — many of them officers with the G.R.U. — as a protest against the poisoning. Russia retaliated with its own expulsions.
Before ordering the expulsions, Britain privately presented its case against Russia to other governments, including evidence that G.R.U. cyberspecialists had hacked the email accounts of Mr. Skripal’s daughter in 2013. Both Mr. Skripal and his daughter were under surveillance before the attack, and her phone was possibly infected with malware to track her whereabouts, the BBC reported this month.
Mr. Skripal’s final post with the G.R.U. was as a high-level personnel administrator, providing him with extensive knowledge of operations and individual agents. He was arrested in Russia in 2004 and later pleaded guilty to espionage, serving six years of a 13-year sentence before he was released in 2010 as part of a spy swap with the United States.
Mr. Skripal was living in Salisbury, England, before the poisoning attack. He and his daughter, who was visiting him from Russia at the time, have since recovered and are living in hiding. The crime’s repercussions continued last week with the death of a 44-year-old British citizen, Dawn Sturgess, who, the police say, most likely accidentally touched residue of the nerve agent used in the attack.
Investigators removing the bench around which the Skripals were found in Salisbury, England, in March.CreditWill Oliver/EPA, via Shutterstock
From the earliest days of the Skripal investigation, the G.R.U. was a suspect, in part because harsh punishment for traitors is part of the agency’s doctrine.
Viktor B. Suvorov, a G.R.U. officer who defected to Britain in 1978, wrote in a memoir that inductees were shown a gruesome film of a defector, strapped to a stretcher, being slowly rolled into a furnace and burned alive. Though his account was disputed by some of his countrymen, it is beyond doubt that G.R.U. defections were rare.
“Once you’re a member of an elite military force like the G.R.U., there is no leaving it,” said Nigel West, a British intelligence historian who has chronicled the lives of many defectors. “They do not defect. G.R.U. are a military, disciplined elite. They know the consequences.”
During the Soviet era, intelligence services had a protocol around assassinations of agents who betrayed their services. It began with a trial, and the sentencing of the traitor to death in absentia. Then the decision would be distributed to counterintelligence officers stationed at Soviet embassies.
A declassified C.I.A. document from 1964 describes K.G.B. assassination teams known as “combat groups,” which consisted of local agents or undercover “illegal staff” stationed all over the world in preparation for killings, known as “wet jobs.” Rather than carrying out the assassination, agents would often use the sentence as leverage to persuade the individual to become a double agent.
In recent years, the Kremlin has steered clear of direct involvement in criminal acts, preferring hybrid operations that cannot be traced to the government, sometimes carried out by retired operatives like the Russian “volunteers” fighting in Ukraine and Syria, who are often veterans of the G.R.U. special forces.
“Our country has come to the understanding that the government should not be committing crimes,” said Dmitri A. Muratov, director of the editorial board at Novaya Gazeta, an independent newspaper that reports on the security services. Hybrid formations, he said, “are close to the government but not of the government.”
He added, “These formations have infiltrated the political life of the country.”
Russian authorities have never disclosed the extent of the damage Mr. Skripal caused the G.R.U., but there are indications it was significant. In “The Devil’s Counterintelligence Dozen,” a book about Mr. Skripal’s years as a British spy, a Russian espionage expert, Nikolai Luzan, writes that the agent might have compromised as many as 300 Russian intelligence officers.
“When a mole is uncovered in any service, you have a massive operation to nail down everything he had access to,” said Mr. Galeotti, the author of “Spetsnaz,” a book about G.R.U. special forces, adding that many colleagues who worked closely with Mr. Skripal would most likely have had their careers ended as part of the sweep.
People leaving the Russian Embassy in London in March after Britain announced the expulsion of Russian diplomats over the use of a nerve agent on British soil.CreditDaniel Leal-Olivas/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
“If people defected earlier in their career, you might find an entire graduating class benched,” he said.
Even after the swap, he was able to damage the G.R.U.’s infrastructure. In 2012, he visited intelligence officers in the Czech Republic who had long felt vulnerable in the face of Russia’s unusually large intelligence presence in the country. Mr. Skripal, who stayed for a long, boozy lunch, was able to help, said a European official.
“In fact, Skripal was able to describe what types of operations they had, how they cover up their people, how they build their teams,” the official said. “He didn’t have to be concrete, to give up concrete names. It contributed to improving our work.”
Over the months that followed, a number of Russian diplomats were expelled from the Czech Republic on suspicion of spying. Mr. Skripal “may have contributed some part of the puzzle” that led to the expulsions, the official said. “Whether he caused them, nobody can tell you.”
In interviews, several former Russian intelligence agents were skeptical that the G.R.U. was behind the attack on the Skripals, in part because of its audacity.
In Soviet times, their more cosmopolitan K.G.B. colleagues referred to G.R.U. officers as “sapogi,” or boots, suggesting that they were tough and rugged but not sophisticated in their methods, said Yuri B. Shvets, a former K.G.B. agent posted to Washington in the 1980s.
“The G.R.U. took its officers from the trenches,” he said, unlike the K.G.B., which recruited from top universities.
Irek Murtazin, who worked closely with the G.R.U. and now covers military affairs for Novaya Gazeta, said that the agency’s assassinations tended to be unshowy affairs.
“He would have died from a heart attack or a stroke, a car would have run him over or a bum would have beat him up,” Mr. Murtazin said. “There wouldn’t have been any Novichok.”
Assassinations, nonetheless, have long been part of Russian and Soviet intelligence practice, Mr. Galeotti said. “That the G.R.U. kills people abroad has been amply demonstrated in a variety of other cases,” he said. “The G.R.U. tends to be more of a kinetic agency — more a bullet in the head rather than an exotic poison. The ultimate point is, from the G.R.U. point of view, it’s the outcomes that matter.”
Follow Ellen Barry, Michael Schwirtz and Eric Schmitt on Twitter: @EllenBarryNYT, @mschwirtz and @EricSchmittNYT.
Ellen Barry reported from London, Michael Schwirtz from Moscow, and Eric Schmitt from Washington.
Immigration decline costing UK economy billions, says think thank - Independent
July 16, 2018
Immigration decline costing UK economy billions, says think thank
The fall in immigration since Brexit is already costing the UK more than £1bn a year, according to new analysis by an independent think tank.
Global Future, which promotes the benefits of openness, calculates that the loss to the public finances is the equivalent of more than 23,000 nurses or 18,000 doctors.
It also claims that meeting the government’s immigration target of “tens of thousands” will also cost Britain £12bn a year by 2023 – which represents 60 per cent of the funds promised to the NHS by Theresa May as part of a so-called “Brexit dividend“.
The figures are based on forecasts by the Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR) of the effects on net borrowing and debt under alternative scenarios of high and low migration.
These estimates suggest a surplus of £16.9bn if net migration fell from its peak of 336,000 in the year ending June 2016 to 185,000 by 2021, compared to a surplus of £5.2bn if it fell to 105,000 by 2021.
May refuses to say which taxes will rise to pay for £20bn NHS boost
Government accused of failing to address ‘hostile’ immigration policy
Javid fails to endorse ‘tens of thousands’ immigration target
Global Futures used these estimates to devise what it called a “ready reckoner” of a cost of £150m for every reduction of 10,000 in net migration.
The latest migration figures are due to be released on Monday but net migration had already fallen to 244,000 in the year ending September 2017.
This translates to a cost of £1.35bn every year if net migration remains the same, with even greater losses if it is reduced to less than 100,000 per year.
“Cutting immigration hits our public finances hard,” said Peter Starkings, Global Future’s director.
“The British people may decide that they are happy to pay a bit more tax or see lower investment in our NHS and other public services in return for a reduction in immigration, but that’s a debate we have simply never had.
“What we do know is that the public think immigration has been good for our economy and our culture, and when offered the choice, they routinely choose economic stability over reducing immigration.
“As the government draws up its plans for a post-Brexit immigration policy, they must be honest about the trade-offs at the heart of this debate. This analysis, based on OBR forecasts, shows that lower immigration means lower public investment, higher borrowing, or higher taxes – and meeting the government’s self-defeating target to reduce net migration to tens of thousands a year would blow a giant multi-billion pound hole in the public finances.
“At a time when crucial sectors like our health service are reporting staffing shortages, government should think very carefully about what a restrictive immigration system will do to our country.”
The OBR forecasts assume that migrants and non-migrants will make the same net contributions to public finances if they have the same age and gender.
Other studies reached different results after attempting to take into account other factors such as increased costs to public services and displacement of British workers.
Migration Watch UK, an independent think thank which supports a reduction in immigration, estimated in May 2016 that immigration was costing the UK nearly £17bn a year, although £15.6bn of this was accounted for by non-EEA migrants.
Both Theresa May and her predecessor David Cameron included the pledge to reduce net migration to the “tens of thousands” in their respective Conservative manifestos but failed to hit the target.
Sajid Javid, the home secretary, recently hinted that the UK government may scrap its pledge at a parliamentary panel on immigration.
“I’m not going to get into numbers,” he said. “Clearly the government has been working towards getting net migration down to more sustainable levels, and that objective continues and will continue in a new immigration system as well.”
Immigration decline costing UK economy billions, says think thank
The fall in immigration since Brexit is already costing the UK more than £1bn a year, according to new analysis by an independent think tank.
Global Future, which promotes the benefits of openness, calculates that the loss to the public finances is the equivalent of more than 23,000 nurses or 18,000 doctors.
It also claims that meeting the government’s immigration target of “tens of thousands” will also cost Britain £12bn a year by 2023 – which represents 60 per cent of the funds promised to the NHS by Theresa May as part of a so-called “Brexit dividend“.
The figures are based on forecasts by the Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR) of the effects on net borrowing and debt under alternative scenarios of high and low migration.
These estimates suggest a surplus of £16.9bn if net migration fell from its peak of 336,000 in the year ending June 2016 to 185,000 by 2021, compared to a surplus of £5.2bn if it fell to 105,000 by 2021.
May refuses to say which taxes will rise to pay for £20bn NHS boost
Government accused of failing to address ‘hostile’ immigration policy
Javid fails to endorse ‘tens of thousands’ immigration target
Global Futures used these estimates to devise what it called a “ready reckoner” of a cost of £150m for every reduction of 10,000 in net migration.
The latest migration figures are due to be released on Monday but net migration had already fallen to 244,000 in the year ending September 2017.
This translates to a cost of £1.35bn every year if net migration remains the same, with even greater losses if it is reduced to less than 100,000 per year.
“Cutting immigration hits our public finances hard,” said Peter Starkings, Global Future’s director.
“The British people may decide that they are happy to pay a bit more tax or see lower investment in our NHS and other public services in return for a reduction in immigration, but that’s a debate we have simply never had.
“What we do know is that the public think immigration has been good for our economy and our culture, and when offered the choice, they routinely choose economic stability over reducing immigration.
“As the government draws up its plans for a post-Brexit immigration policy, they must be honest about the trade-offs at the heart of this debate. This analysis, based on OBR forecasts, shows that lower immigration means lower public investment, higher borrowing, or higher taxes – and meeting the government’s self-defeating target to reduce net migration to tens of thousands a year would blow a giant multi-billion pound hole in the public finances.
“At a time when crucial sectors like our health service are reporting staffing shortages, government should think very carefully about what a restrictive immigration system will do to our country.”
The OBR forecasts assume that migrants and non-migrants will make the same net contributions to public finances if they have the same age and gender.
Other studies reached different results after attempting to take into account other factors such as increased costs to public services and displacement of British workers.
Migration Watch UK, an independent think thank which supports a reduction in immigration, estimated in May 2016 that immigration was costing the UK nearly £17bn a year, although £15.6bn of this was accounted for by non-EEA migrants.
Both Theresa May and her predecessor David Cameron included the pledge to reduce net migration to the “tens of thousands” in their respective Conservative manifestos but failed to hit the target.
Sajid Javid, the home secretary, recently hinted that the UK government may scrap its pledge at a parliamentary panel on immigration.
“I’m not going to get into numbers,” he said. “Clearly the government has been working towards getting net migration down to more sustainable levels, and that objective continues and will continue in a new immigration system as well.”
China's second quarter growth meets expectations at 6.7% =BBC News
July 16, 2018
China's second quarter growth meets expectations at 6.7%
China's economy grew at an annual pace of 6.7% in the three months to June, official data showed, meeting forecasts for the period.
That marked a slight slowdown from a 6.8% expansion recorded in the previous quarter.
The data comes as the government attempts to curb growing debt and as trade tensions with the US escalate.
The US raised the stakes in a trade war last week, listing another $200bn worth of Chinese goods to be hit by tariffs.
Chinese stock markets, which have struggled recently amid the escalating trade dispute between the US and China, traded down slightly on Monday.
How a US-China trade war could hurt us all
US-China trade row: What has happened so far?
"GDP growth eased... on softer global trade and the tightening of financial policy since early 2018," Oxford Economics said in a research note.
It expects slow credit growth and softer real estate activity - along with the "intensifying trade conflict with the US" - to weigh on China's growth in the second half of 2018.
The US slapped tariffs on $34bn of Chinese goods on 6 July, opening the way for a tit-for-tat trade war with the world's second-largest economy.
China retaliated, saying the US had launched the "largest trade war in economic history".
However, Tom Rafferty from the Economist Intelligence Unit said there were also worries about the strength of China's domestic economy.
"The EIU is more concerned about slowing domestic demand within China's economy, with investment persistently weak and consumption also having slowed, and these are much more important drivers of growth than exports," he said in a research note.
China's monthly trade surplus with the US hit a record high of nearly $29bn (£22bn) in June as exports to America remained strong.
US President Donald Trump recently suggested that more than $500bn of Chinese goods could be hit by tariffs. That is almost equal to the value of China's entire goods exports to the US last year.
China's second quarter growth meets expectations at 6.7%
China's economy grew at an annual pace of 6.7% in the three months to June, official data showed, meeting forecasts for the period.
That marked a slight slowdown from a 6.8% expansion recorded in the previous quarter.
The data comes as the government attempts to curb growing debt and as trade tensions with the US escalate.
The US raised the stakes in a trade war last week, listing another $200bn worth of Chinese goods to be hit by tariffs.
Chinese stock markets, which have struggled recently amid the escalating trade dispute between the US and China, traded down slightly on Monday.
How a US-China trade war could hurt us all
US-China trade row: What has happened so far?
"GDP growth eased... on softer global trade and the tightening of financial policy since early 2018," Oxford Economics said in a research note.
It expects slow credit growth and softer real estate activity - along with the "intensifying trade conflict with the US" - to weigh on China's growth in the second half of 2018.
The US slapped tariffs on $34bn of Chinese goods on 6 July, opening the way for a tit-for-tat trade war with the world's second-largest economy.
China retaliated, saying the US had launched the "largest trade war in economic history".
However, Tom Rafferty from the Economist Intelligence Unit said there were also worries about the strength of China's domestic economy.
"The EIU is more concerned about slowing domestic demand within China's economy, with investment persistently weak and consumption also having slowed, and these are much more important drivers of growth than exports," he said in a research note.
China's monthly trade surplus with the US hit a record high of nearly $29bn (£22bn) in June as exports to America remained strong.
US President Donald Trump recently suggested that more than $500bn of Chinese goods could be hit by tariffs. That is almost equal to the value of China's entire goods exports to the US last year.
Trump-Putin summit: 'US foolishness caused Russia tensions' - BBC News
July 16, 2018
Trump-Putin summit: 'US foolishness caused Russia tensions'
President Trump arrived in Finland with First Lady Melania Trump
Donald Trump has said ties with Russia have "NEVER been worse" and blamed US politicians, ahead of his first-ever summit with counterpart Vladimir Putin.
In a tweet the US president denounced his predecessor's "stupidity" and the "rigged" inquiry into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election.
The summit is being held in the Finnish capital, Helsinki, later on Monday.
Some US politicians had called for it to be cancelled after 12 Russians were charged with hacking on Friday.
Live updates: Trump-Putin summit
The defendants - all Russian intelligence officers - are accused of launching cyber-attacks on the 2016 presidential campaign of Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.
But in his tweet, Mr Trump put the blame for the deterioration of relations with Russia squarely on US domestic forces.
Donald J. Trump
✔
@realDonaldTrump
Our relationship with Russia has NEVER been worse thanks to many years of U.S. foolishness and stupidity and now, the Rigged Witch Hunt!
4:05 PM - Jul 16, 2018
BBC diplomatic correspondent James Robbins says the tweet is likely to alarm White House advisers, already nervous about the risks of giving too much ground to the Russian leader during the talks.
Many in the West have criticised Moscow for what they regard as its destabilising activities in Ukraine. The US, among others, has imposed sanctions on Russia over its annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Why is Trump meeting Putin a big deal?
Who's who in Trump-Russia drama?
The summit - in which the two leaders will be joined only by their interpreters - comes after a tumultuous European tour that saw Mr Trump criticise allies of the US over trade and military spending.
Trump: I have low expectations for Putin meeting
What are the main sources of tension with Russia?
Russia has been criticised in the US because of its military support for President Bashar al-Assad in Syria as well as its actions in Ukraine.
Tensions also are high as a result of accusations of Russian interference in the 2016 election in the US. The allegations are being investigated by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
Mr Trump has consistently denounced the inquiry as a "witch hunt".
Four intriguing lines in Mueller charges
The 12 Russians indicted on Friday were targeted as part of Mr Mueller's investigation.
They are accused of using keystroke-reading software to spy on the chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and hack into the party's computers.
Protesters in Finland have been urging Mr Trump to focus on human rights ahead of his visit.
Top Democrats including party chairman Tom Perez have urged Mr Trump to cancel the talks, saying Mr Putin was "not a friend of the United States".
On the Republican side, Senator John McCain said the summit "should not move forward" unless the president "is prepared to hold Putin accountable".
Russia denies the hacking allegations, and says it is looking forward to the talks as a vehicle for improving relations.
What will be discussed at the summit?
US National Security Adviser John Bolton has said that both sides have agreed the meeting will have no set agenda.
But he said he found it "hard to believe" Mr Putin did not know about the alleged election hacking and the subject would be mentioned.
"That's what one of the purposes of this meeting is, so the president can see eye to eye with President Putin and ask him about it," he told ABC News.
The two leaders will meet at the presidential palace in Helsinki
Mr Trump has also been urged to raise the poisoning of two people in the UK who came into contact with the nerve agent Novichok on 30 June. Investigators believe the incident is linked to the poisoning of a former Russian spy and his daughter in March.
Mr Trump elaborated on what would be discussed at the summit during a joint press conference with UK Prime Minister Theresa May last week.
"We'll be talking about Syria," he said. "We'll be talking about other parts of the Middle East. I will be talking about nuclear proliferation."
An uncertain spectacle
By Lyse Doucet, Chief International Correspondent, BBC News, Helsinki
Both leaders will feel they have won simply by meeting with the eyes of the world upon them.
President Putin, still basking in the glory of hosting the World Cup, will project Russian power as he stands shoulder to shoulder with his American counterpart. There is a lot in this for him.
President Trump will again savour the spotlight as the world's self-proclaimed dealmaker. He attacks allies and admires strongmen like the Russian leader.
His penchant for disruptive diplomacy means he could announce unexpected concessions and startle allies and advisers alike.
There could also be some rewards. A dialogue is crucial. Significant issues ranging from a nuclear arms race to wars in Syria and Ukraine deserve their attention.
But with no agenda, little preparation, and a lot of Trumpian unpredictability, no-one can be certain what will actually happen.
What has Mr Trump been doing so far in Europe?
His tour has included a Nato summit in Belgium and a visit to the UK. Neither passed without controversy.
Following the Nato summit, Mr Trump said the allies had pledged to "substantially" raise their defence budgets but other leaders cast doubt on this claim.
The UK visit also had its ups and downs after Mr Trump told a newspaper the US would probably not give the UK a trade deal under the terms of Mrs May's Brexit plans - and then later appeared to backtrack on this position.
He also said Europe was "losing its character" because of immigration from Africa and the Middle East.
On Sunday, just before he departed for Helsinki, Mr Trump described the European Union as a foe on trade.
He told CBS News that European countries were taking advantage of the US and not paying their Nato bills.
Trump-Putin summit: 'US foolishness caused Russia tensions'
President Trump arrived in Finland with First Lady Melania Trump
Donald Trump has said ties with Russia have "NEVER been worse" and blamed US politicians, ahead of his first-ever summit with counterpart Vladimir Putin.
In a tweet the US president denounced his predecessor's "stupidity" and the "rigged" inquiry into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election.
The summit is being held in the Finnish capital, Helsinki, later on Monday.
Some US politicians had called for it to be cancelled after 12 Russians were charged with hacking on Friday.
Live updates: Trump-Putin summit
The defendants - all Russian intelligence officers - are accused of launching cyber-attacks on the 2016 presidential campaign of Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.
But in his tweet, Mr Trump put the blame for the deterioration of relations with Russia squarely on US domestic forces.
Donald J. Trump
✔
@realDonaldTrump
Our relationship with Russia has NEVER been worse thanks to many years of U.S. foolishness and stupidity and now, the Rigged Witch Hunt!
4:05 PM - Jul 16, 2018
BBC diplomatic correspondent James Robbins says the tweet is likely to alarm White House advisers, already nervous about the risks of giving too much ground to the Russian leader during the talks.
Many in the West have criticised Moscow for what they regard as its destabilising activities in Ukraine. The US, among others, has imposed sanctions on Russia over its annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Why is Trump meeting Putin a big deal?
Who's who in Trump-Russia drama?
The summit - in which the two leaders will be joined only by their interpreters - comes after a tumultuous European tour that saw Mr Trump criticise allies of the US over trade and military spending.
Trump: I have low expectations for Putin meeting
What are the main sources of tension with Russia?
Russia has been criticised in the US because of its military support for President Bashar al-Assad in Syria as well as its actions in Ukraine.
Tensions also are high as a result of accusations of Russian interference in the 2016 election in the US. The allegations are being investigated by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
Mr Trump has consistently denounced the inquiry as a "witch hunt".
Four intriguing lines in Mueller charges
The 12 Russians indicted on Friday were targeted as part of Mr Mueller's investigation.
They are accused of using keystroke-reading software to spy on the chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and hack into the party's computers.
Protesters in Finland have been urging Mr Trump to focus on human rights ahead of his visit.
Top Democrats including party chairman Tom Perez have urged Mr Trump to cancel the talks, saying Mr Putin was "not a friend of the United States".
On the Republican side, Senator John McCain said the summit "should not move forward" unless the president "is prepared to hold Putin accountable".
Russia denies the hacking allegations, and says it is looking forward to the talks as a vehicle for improving relations.
What will be discussed at the summit?
US National Security Adviser John Bolton has said that both sides have agreed the meeting will have no set agenda.
But he said he found it "hard to believe" Mr Putin did not know about the alleged election hacking and the subject would be mentioned.
"That's what one of the purposes of this meeting is, so the president can see eye to eye with President Putin and ask him about it," he told ABC News.
The two leaders will meet at the presidential palace in Helsinki
Mr Trump has also been urged to raise the poisoning of two people in the UK who came into contact with the nerve agent Novichok on 30 June. Investigators believe the incident is linked to the poisoning of a former Russian spy and his daughter in March.
Mr Trump elaborated on what would be discussed at the summit during a joint press conference with UK Prime Minister Theresa May last week.
"We'll be talking about Syria," he said. "We'll be talking about other parts of the Middle East. I will be talking about nuclear proliferation."
An uncertain spectacle
By Lyse Doucet, Chief International Correspondent, BBC News, Helsinki
Both leaders will feel they have won simply by meeting with the eyes of the world upon them.
President Putin, still basking in the glory of hosting the World Cup, will project Russian power as he stands shoulder to shoulder with his American counterpart. There is a lot in this for him.
President Trump will again savour the spotlight as the world's self-proclaimed dealmaker. He attacks allies and admires strongmen like the Russian leader.
His penchant for disruptive diplomacy means he could announce unexpected concessions and startle allies and advisers alike.
There could also be some rewards. A dialogue is crucial. Significant issues ranging from a nuclear arms race to wars in Syria and Ukraine deserve their attention.
But with no agenda, little preparation, and a lot of Trumpian unpredictability, no-one can be certain what will actually happen.
What has Mr Trump been doing so far in Europe?
His tour has included a Nato summit in Belgium and a visit to the UK. Neither passed without controversy.
Following the Nato summit, Mr Trump said the allies had pledged to "substantially" raise their defence budgets but other leaders cast doubt on this claim.
The UK visit also had its ups and downs after Mr Trump told a newspaper the US would probably not give the UK a trade deal under the terms of Mrs May's Brexit plans - and then later appeared to backtrack on this position.
He also said Europe was "losing its character" because of immigration from Africa and the Middle East.
On Sunday, just before he departed for Helsinki, Mr Trump described the European Union as a foe on trade.
He told CBS News that European countries were taking advantage of the US and not paying their Nato bills.
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