Russia ready to continue dialogue if US is willing, Putin says after meeting Biden
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The tone of the meeting was expected to be a little grim but the two leaders surprised the world by cordially extending an olive branch
Almost a day after meeting the US President, Joe Biden, in a historic summit, the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, has said his government is ready to continue the dialogue with the US if the other side agrees.
"We are ready to continue this dialogue to the same extent as the American side is," Putin said during a televised session.
His statement has come after the two world leaders held detailed discussions on various issues on Wednesday at the picturesque villa in Geneva.
The tone of the meeting was expected to be a little grim but the two leaders surprised the world by cordially extending an olive branch, while slyly staying away from matters that have erupted in chaos in the recent past.
"Biden is a professional, you have to be very attentive when working with him so as not to miss something," Putin said.
Also read | Day after Putin-Biden summit, Kremlin says Ukraine joining NATO would be a 'red line' for Russia
However, Putin also took a sly dig at Biden infamously mixing up Syria and Libya at the G7 conference. "So what that he sometimes confuses things. His press secretary is a young, educated, beautiful woman -- she herself constantly confuses things," Putin remarked, referring to White House press secretary Jen Psaki. "It is not because she is poorly educated or has a bad memory, just when people think that some things are secondary they don't focus too much attention on them."
"I know that you have been on a long trip and had a lot of work, still the US-Russian relations have a lot of issues accumulated that require meetings at the highest level," Putin told Biden before starting the summit.
Meanwhile, Biden, too, assured everyone that the US is "not looking for conflict" but also announced that the US “is back” after the Trump era and will "respond if Russia continues its harmful activities".
Putin, too, after the summit claimed that "Americans think that nothing is more important than themselves".