FROM EIR DAILY ALERT

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Putin Ready for a Washington Summit; Ryabkov Encourages U.S.-Russian Business Collaboration

Oct. 25, 2018 (EIRNS)—Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists yesterday the Kremlin was ready to discuss the possibility of a summit in Washington next year, in addition to the expected meeting between Trump and Putin in Paris on Nov. 11, after U.S. National Security Advisor John Bolton, in Moscow told Russia’s Interfax news agency that such a full-scale summit was possible. “Undoubtedly (we are) ready,” Peskov told journalists. He also confirmed that the issue has been “raised” during Bolton’s Oct. 23 meeting with the Russian President, but that “so far there is no concrete decision on this.”

Also on Oct. 24, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov told Channel One there should be broad cooperation between Russian and U.S. business in the sphere of high technology.

“I want to confirm the interest of business circles of the two countries toward expanding cooperation and, at the very least, toward continuing the wide cooperation not only in trade, let’s say in metals and soybeans, but also in the high-technology sector, including start-ups and pharmaceuticals, aviation, titanium production, and so on,”

Ryabkov said reported TASS.

“Sanctions are an obstacle, but interests prevail. The U.S. delegation has been the biggest at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum for two consecutive years. Unfortunately, we see political leverage in the U.S., when economic and business interests are in fact sacrificed to geopolitics,”

Ryabkov stated. It was impossible to imagine five or ten years ago that “the U.S. would risk their own fundamental principles of freedom of entrepreneurship, inviolability of U.S. dollar as a world reserve currency,” he went on. “However, I think that from the economic point of view, the prospects for our relations are better than they seem.”