You're reading: Ushakov says Putin to have separate meetings with Hollande, Merkel

MOSCOW - Russian President Vladimir Putin will have a meeting with his French counterpart Francois Hollande in Hangzhou on September 4 and a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on September 5, no trilateral meeting is planned, Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov said.

“We are planning to hold one more bilateral meeting with President Hollande. It has not yet been formalized, but it was agreed that the presidents of Russia and France will carry out another bilateral contact in Hangzhou,” he told reporters.

“As of a meeting with Merkel, we are currently agreeing the time of this meeting, and, obviously, it will take place on September 5,” he said.

“Initially the sides agreed to hold a trilateral meeting to discuss the current situation in Ukraine in details, line of further cooperation as part of the Normandy format, the Minsk process, but then our counterparts, referring to the schedules, opted to hold two bilateral meetings, in other words, a separate meeting with Hollande and a separate meeting with German Chancellor Merkel will be held,” he said.

The main subject of both meetings will be the situation in Ukraine, Ushakov said.

Replying to a follow-up question as to whether the meeting of the Normandy format leaders will not take place in Hangzhou, Ushakov said: “You surely know the story. Ukraine is not a G20 member, but Poroshenko during a telephone conversation offered to use the Hangzhou summit for the purpose of holding a top-level meeting in the Normandy format.”

“The meeting was not agreed upon, and after the known events in Crimea our president clearly voiced his attitude towards such possible contact. We refused even to consider such prospect,” he added.

“But you got it right: if there are three Normandy format participants and they are meeting separately, then there will be no Normandy format in China,” he said.