Vladimir Putin should “earn” a summit with U.S. President Donald Trump as if he gets one too easily he may get ideas above his station, Polish Foreign minister Radoslaw Sikorski has said.
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Thursday, Sikorski said a recent statement by Donald Trump about imposing stricter sanctions on Russia unless Putin ended his “ridiculous war” in Ukraine, was very important.
Sikorski added that Trump had started his second term well and that his position on Putin gave “intellectual clarity” to the situation by showing who was at fault.
“The president of the U.S. is the leader of the free world while Vladimir Putin is an outcast and stands accused of war crimes for the abduction of Ukrainian children,” the Polish foreign minister said. “I would suggest that Putin should earn a summit because if he gets one too soon, he will get ideas above his station and have a bad impression of the situation.”
Sikorski went on to offer Trump a warning about his Russian counterpart, cautioning that “this is a different Putin than you had to deal with in your first term.”
“This is the Putin that started a full-scale war in Europe and who is responsible for murder [and] war crimes and stands accused before the tribunal in the Hague of abducting Ukrainian children and changing their identity,” he said.
Sikorski added that whether peace is achieved this year depends on one person alone—Vladimir Putin.
