Biden and Putin hold milestone in Geneva

President Biden stood up for his on Wednesday eagerly awaited meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva, Switzerland. Mr Biden faced Putin after a week of making alliances with America’s closest allies. He attended his first NATO summit as a US leader first G-7 conference, and a summit with the heads of state or government of the European Union last week.

Mr Biden and Putin stood on the front steps of the Geneva hotel hosting the summit and shook hands in front of the news cameras before going in around 1:30 p.m. to begin their talks. Local time (7:30 a.m. Eastern).

The heads of state and government should hold separate press conferences after the summit, which should last up to five hours.

At a Press conference on Monday, Mr Biden declined to say what he wanted from the meeting with the Russian leader that comes after a series of cyberattacks on US infrastructure that is being blamed Russian hackers.

The US and its allies have put Putin under pressure over the cyberattacks and a number of other problems, including those of his country Support the rebels in Ukraine, the crackdown on political dissidents in Russia, including the opposition leader Alexey Navalny, American Citizens imprisoned in Russia, and Moscow’s weapons program.

One recently CBS News Poll found that the majority of Americans want Biden to take a tough stance on Putin rather than opting for a more cooperative approach with the autocrat known for permitting human rights abuses.

“I’ve been doing this for a long time,” Biden said on Monday when asked what he would expect from Putin. “The last thing anyone would do is negotiate in front of the world press how they will approach a critical meeting with another adversary and / or someone who might be an adversary. That’s the last thing I’m going to do. I’m going to tell you this: I’m going to make it clear to President Putin that there are areas where we can cooperate, if he wants cybersecurity and some other activity then we will respond. We will respond in kind. “