Donald Trump, Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin are planning to meet on 19 November on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Shenzhen, China. An unnamed White House spokesperson told the New York Post of the plans; the meeting was later confirmed by other media outlets.
There have been no official comments from Moscow or Beijing as yet. The Kremlin had previously indicated that such a meeting was possible.
If it goes ahead, it will be the first-ever trilateral meeting between the leaders of the US, Russia and China — the countries with the largest nuclear arsenals.
According to the White House spokesperson, the main topic will be nuclear arms control. Trump had previously spoken about this as well. The parties may also discuss Iran and North Korea. As officially stated, there are no plans to address the Russian-Ukrainian war.
“We really believe that the time has come for China to sit down at the table with the grown-ups, so to speak, and have serious conversations about serious matters,” an unnamed senior US official told Radio Free Europe.
He acknowledged that the task is a difficult one and noted that the US side does not expect any agreement to be reached as a result of the meeting. In his words, this is “the start of a dialogue which, we hope, may prove productive in the future”.
As reported by a Radio Free Europe correspondent, citing an administration spokesperson, Trump does not plan to hold a separate bilateral meeting with Putin. Earlier, Ukraine and the European Union had expressed concerns that the leaders of the three countries might discuss “Ukraine without Ukraine”.
With US mediation, talks between the Ukrainian and Russian delegations on a possible peaceful settlement have recently resumed. It was reported that representatives of the European Union may join these talks.
The US Institute for the Study of War believes that the Kremlin has been attempting to focus the trilateral talks between the US, Russia and Ukraine on a fundamental change to the architecture of European security. According to the institute, this is an attempt to return to the ultimatums that Russia issued to the US and NATO in 2021, which concerned a reduction in the alliance’s presence in Europe.
The original version of this article first appeared on Glob-News.com.