The US Secret Service, responsible for protecting the country's top officials, has rented a home in Anchorage, Alaska, ahead of a meeting between Russian and American leaders Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump, The New York Times reported.
The location of the meeting has not yet been officially announced, but real estate broker Larry Disbrough told the publication that he has rented a “six-bedroom“ in Anchorage at the request of the Secret Service.
European countries are trying to arrange talks with U.S. President Donald Trump before his planned meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Alaska, Bloomberg reported, citing sources.
According to them, European leaders want to talk with Trump before Friday, when he is scheduled to meet with Putin. The initiative follows intensive diplomatic contacts over the weekend, including a meeting between U.S. Vice President Jay D. Vance and British Foreign Secretary David Lammy on Saturday. EU ambassadors were briefed on the talks on Sunday, and a virtual meeting of the heads of diplomatic missions of the EU countries will be held on Monday.
Ahead of the US-Russia summit scheduled for August 15 in Alaska, European leaders are proposing to increase pressure on Moscow, including using the possibility of transferring Russia's frozen assets to Kiev as leverage in the negotiations.
This was reported by the „Financial Times“, citing unnamed EU officials.
According to the article, one of the proposals is to transfer 190 billion euros of Russian assets, which are stored on the international platform Euroclear in Belgium, to Ukraine as a loan.
„At some point, a discussion may begin about what to do with these Russian assets if Russia does not compensate Ukraine for the damage caused,“ a senior EU official told the publication. EU.
Earlier, Russian Ambassador to the UK Andrei Kelin warned in a conversation with a TASS correspondent that there are no scenarios for a fair seizure of the frozen reserves of the Bank of Russia, as this carries the risk of undermining confidence in the reliability of Western financial markets.
Also, the Financial Times writes, European leaders support Volodymyr Zelensky's participation in the upcoming US-Russia summit, providing Kiev with security guarantees and the absence of restrictions on the size of the future Ukrainian army and the volume of Western weapons provided to it. At the same time, European leaders do not support the idea of a territorial exchange as part of the conflict settlement, the article says.