President Donald Trump is scheduled to hold an official bilateral meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the G20 summit in Hamburg on Friday rather than a more typical informal discussion in light of tensions between the U.S. and Russia.
The White House on Tuesday confirmed that Trump will hold a “normal bilateral meeting” with Putin on Friday afternoon, according to a pool report.
“It is planned as a fully-fledged, ‘seated’ meeting,” Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov told Russia’s state-run TASS news agency.
The official meeting carries more legitimacy than the informal “pull-aside” some White House officials reportedly pushed for.
CNN noted the meeting will be the first official meeting of its kind between a U.S. and Russian leader in almost two years, and will come amid questions about Russian interference in the 2016 election and an accelerating probe into whether members of Trump’s campaign colluded with Russian officials.
