Biden says he is not yet ready for talks with Putin

WASHINGTON | TASS | US President Joe Biden said he was not ready to engage in a direct conversation with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, adding that he saw no practical reason in doing so at this point.

“I have no good reason to talk to Putin right now,” he told reporters during the post-NATO summit press conference in Washington. “There is not much that he [Putin] is prepared to do in terms of accommodating any change in his behavior.”

“There isn’t any world leader that I’m not prepared to deal with, but <…> the point is if Putin is ready to talk. I’m not ready to talk to Putin lest Putin is ready to change his behavior,” the US president said.

However, he said shortly after that he would be ready to talk with the Russian president, if the latter initiated the phone call.

“I think that I’m prepared to talk to any leader, who wants to talk, including if Putin called me and wanted to talk,” Biden said.

“Last time I talked to Putin I was trying to get him on arms control agreement, related to nuclear weapons in space,” the US leader added, without elaborating on when exactly the conversation took place.