United States President Donald Trump has invited Russian President Vladimir Putin to Washington, Reuters quoted US National Security Advisor John Bolton as saying on Friday. The two leaders have met on several occasions on the sidelines of multilateral gatherings, and participated in a single bilateral summit in Finland’s capital Helsinki in July.
“We have invited President Putin to Washington,” Bolton said. However, it was not clear if Putin has accepted the invitation.
Bolton spent the week meeting senior Russian officials after Trump announced on October 20 that the US will pull out from a Cold War nuclear treaty, signed in 1987.
After the Helsinki meeting, Trump was widely criticised as Putin rejected allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 US presidential elections. Trump had also asked his administration to formally invite Putin to visit America at the end of this year.
Confirming his willingness to travel to Washington for a new summit, Putin then invited Trump to visit Moscow. The Russian leader had said that telephone calls between Moscow and Washington were insufficient and that both sides needed to meet to talk about pressing matters such as global conflicts.
Meanwhile, the two leaders are planning to hold a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of events in Paris on November 11 to commemorate the centenary of the end of World War One.
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