As Donald Trump hosts Vladimir Putin for talks in Alaska aimed at ending the Russian war on Ukraine, some Ukrainians watching from afar have noticed that the US literally rolled out a red carpet for the Russian president, who is an indicted war criminal charged with kidnapping Ukrainian children from Russian-occupied regions of their country.
The fact that the US president clapped for the Russian president and indicted war criminal, prompted the Russia-born cold war historian Sergey Radchenko to post a mind-blown emoji on X. “I argued in my book how the Russians crave nothing quite as much as recognition by the U.S.” he added. “Well, there we have it. There it is.”
Trump’s three rounds of applause were captured on a live stream on the White House YouTube channel. But, a few minutes later, when the White House posted video of the greeting on social media, the clip was edited to begin a split-second after Trump finished his third round of applause for Putin.
The video posted on the official White House Instagram and X accounts shows that Trump’s left arm is still swinging by his side as the clip begins. A look at the original live stream reveals that his arm had just dropped to his side at that point, after being raised in front of the president to clap for the Russian leader wanted by the international court of justice for the kidnapping of Ukrainian children.
Meanwhile, reporters have been called into the room set up for a joint news conference with Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, my colleague David Smith reports from Anchorage.
The UK Guardian
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