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Helsinki – Before attacking his European tour, Donald Trump had predicted that the Helsinki leg, where he must meet Vladimir Putin, would be the "easiest one". Their summit, however, looks particularly thorny.
The US President and his Russian counterpart, whose every move will be carefully scrutinized around the world, will end up in the Finnish capital after a weekend " athlete ".
The first taste of the joys of golf – his " main form of exercise " according to his terms – in his luxurious Scottish resort of Turnberry.
The second will attend Sunday night's final of the World Cup-2018 football in Moscow between France and Croatia.
On this occasion, he will meet with the heads of state of the two finalist nations, Frenchman Emmanuel Macron and Croatian Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic.
If the stages of the 45th President of the United States in Brussels and London were stormy, marked by his virulent charges against NATO allies, – Germany in the lead, accused of being " prisoner "Russians – points of friction between Washington and Moscow are not lacking.
Attachment in March 2014 of the Ukrainian Peninsula of Crimea by Moscow, support of Russia to the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad, new US tariffs … The list is long.
The two presidents will meet first one-on-one with their only interpreters at the Presidential Palace, before opening the meeting at their respective delegations for a working lunch.
The day will end with a joint press conference that could be very colorful given the propensity of the real estate mogul to leap from one subject to another and to get carried away face journalists who he likes to describe " Fake news ".
– " Faculty to read the personalities " –
Faced with Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump will take the role of leader of the " free world " and to ask him for accounts?
Will he instead try to caress the Russian leader in the direction of the hair as he did with the Chinese Xi Jinping and even the North Korean Kim Jong Un?
What will be the strategy of the strongman of the Kremlin?
" Putin demonstrated his incredible ability to read personalities ", badyzes Alina Polyakova, of the Brookings Institution.
" This is what he was trained for, after all, as an intelligence officer and I think he is particularly good at detecting weaknesses ".
In an open letter to the US president, half a dozen Democratic senators urged him not to negotiate alone with the strongman of the Kremlin.
" There must be other Americans in the room ," they said, even though their request is unlikely to be heard by the president in his seventies.
Three days before the meeting, another sensitive topic was dramatically reimposed to the menu of the discussion: the indictment of twelve Russian intelligence agents in the investigation of the Kremlin interference in the 2016 presidential election
On Friday, Donald Trump pledged to put the subject on the table in Helsinki.
" I absolutely and firmly ask the question ," he said, hammering that he was " much firmer on Russia than anyone else ".
He denies any collusion with Moscow and tirelessly denounces a " witch hunt " led by an FBI in the pay of Democrats.
Russia also denies any interference as it denies its responsibility for the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Novichok in March in Salisbury, South West England. .
Both survived but a 44-year-old Briton died last week in the same area, and a " small bottle " containing the innervating agent was found at her mate's home.
" If we can develop a relationship (with Mr. Putin) " it would be fantastic ", goes repeating Donald Trump
For Maria Lipman, an independent political badyst based in Moscow, the meeting will be delicate because what unites the two men is ultimately that " neither one (…) is ready to yield under the pressure ".
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