Cold War antecedents marking Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin’s summit in neutral capital of peace Geneva

The summit to be held tomorrow in Geneva by the President of the United States, Joe Biden, and of Russia, Vladimir Putin, will define whether a certain dialogue between the two powers is possible, as it was in 1955 or 1985, moments of great tension and multiple mutual threats, including nuclear power, which, although unresolved, have calmed down in this same city, known to be the capital of peace.

Good offices have been part of the tradition of Swiss foreign policy since the nineteenth century, which has exercised them in multiple circumstances, for example by currently representing the interests of the United States in Iran, since there is no no diplomatic relations between them.

Geneva, Switzerland’s main French-speaking city, is popular with Russians and Americans, who They are very accustomed to meeting in these lands, either for discreet discussions or for political negotiations at the highest level, such as those which allowed them to move forward on disarmament issues, to close the nuclear treaty with the United States. Iran or agree to eliminate chemical weapons that Syria possessed. .

Some diplomatic attempts which have also recently taken place in Geneva have been less successful, such as the one which sought to promote a political settlement of the war in Syria or the one which more recently promoted the reunification of the island of Cyprus, both under the auspices of the United Nations, of which It has its European headquarters in this same city.

The series of Russian-American political encounters in contemporary history dates back to 1955, when US President Dwight Eisenhower met Russian leader Nikolai Bulganin at a summit which also included prime ministers of the Kingdom and France. , the allies with whom the first country had won World War II ten years earlier.

These talks were influenced by the common goal of reducing international tensions and improving global security.

30 years later, US Presidents Ronald Reagan and Russian Presidents Mikhail Gorbachev held a series of meetings in which the relaxed atmosphere and suspicious stares at the start were replaced by images of conversations in which both smiled casually.

If the two leaders met at the time in a mansion built in a park of more than 80,000 square meters with a view of the Alps, Biden and Poutine chose a similar space: Villa La Grange, located in the park of the same name, the largest in Geneva and listed as a historic monument.

The diplomática tradition of Suiza is an así a la atmósfera que puede ofrecer ya su capacidad de organización y de Garantizar la seguridad de este tipo de eventos, como lo hace cada año con el Foro Económico Mundial, a la que acuden líderes delómicos y ec whole world.

“The choice of Switzerland makes sense because of its long tradition and because it offers a space of neutrality in the European context”said Professor Robert Legvold, specialist in relations with post-Soviet states at Columbia University.

I remembered that “Over time, the meetings in Geneva have been fundamental to the relations between the United States and Russia and what is associated with them is generally positive, as when Reagan and Gorvachev spoke of eliminating nuclear weapons,” well that they did not do it later.

“If there is a capital where it has been negotiated and advanced, it is Geneva, since the period of the Cold War and the NATO and Warsaw Pact alliances, two blocks from which Switzerland was outside. and before which it was neutral “.

(with information from the EFE)

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