The Russian government appears to be warming to the prospect of a meeting between Vladimir Putin and Tony Abbott, with officials pointing to a sidelines conversation either at Apec in Beijing this weekend, or at the G20 leaders meeting in Brisbane the following week.
The Russian news agency Tass quoted the president’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying: “They will have an opportunity to have talks on the sidelines of one or another summit in any case.”
In mid-October Abbott declared his intention to “shirtfront” the Russian president about the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 and the death of 38 Australian citizens and residents – a declaration Russian diplomats subsequently mocked.
There was political debate in Australia about whether Putin should attend the G20 summit given the MH17 tragedy. The Abbott government made it clear the decision to invite Putin was made by a consensus of the G20 leaders, not by Australia as host.
But it remained unclear whether Putin would meet one-on-one with Abbott.
On Thursday, the prime minister told reporters in Canberra he would speak to Putin “one way or another” in Beijing or Brisbane.
The Tass report was equivocal about what the two leaders would discuss, but Abbott said he would use the conversation to press the point that Australia expected full cooperation with the investigation into the downing of MH17.
“We owe it to our dead to secure justice, and Russia as a member of the international community owes it to the world, owes it to humanity, to ensure that justice is done, and wherever possible the perpetrators of this crime are brought to justice,” he told reporters.
Putin also used a pre-Apec briefing with Chinese media to dismiss the Trans Pacific Partnership – a regional trade agreement being spearheaded by the United States.
Putin argued the TPP amounted to Washington attempting “to build an architecture of regional economic cooperation that the US would benefit from”. The Russian president said he would instead back a Chinese-led “road map” towards an Asia-Pacific free trade zone – a draft of which will be discussed at Apec.
