Russian PresidentVladimir Putinhas not yet decided if he will attend the G20 summit in the United States in December, the Kremlin said Thursday, after Russian media reported that Moscow had been formally invited.
Putin has not participated in a meeting of the group — made up of the world’s top economies — since 2019, first because of the coronavirus pandemic and then due to the war in Ukraine.
When asked by AFP whether Putin would attend this year, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: “no such decisions have been made yet”.
Russia was invited at “the highest level” for the summit in Miami on December 14-15, the state news agency RIA Novosti quoted Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Pankin as saying.
After sending troops into neighbouringUkrainein 2022, Russia was slapped with numerous international sanctions and faced diplomatic isolation from the West.
In 2023, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Putin over the war, limiting the Russian leader’s travel.
The United States is not a member of the ICC and Putin travelled to Alaska last August for a summit with US President Donald Trump.
Since returning to the White House last year, Trump has sought to revive the long-frozen relations with Russia in a bid to end the war in Ukraine.
Initially promising to end the war in 24 hours, Trump’s attempts so far have delivered few tangible results, even as Moscow and Kyiv met multiple times for talks.
Agence France-Presse (AFP) is a French international news agency headquartered in Paris, France. Founded in 1835 as Havas, it is the world's oldest news agency.
Source: Insider Paper
