Putin arrives in Vietnam to attend APEC summit

Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in the Vietnamese city of Da Nang on Friday to take part in the summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, the news agency TASS reports.

He is also expected to hold a number of bilateral meetings on the sidelines of the forum, including with US President Donald Trump, and with International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director Christine Lagarde.

After the summit, the leaders are expected to adopt a joint declaration on the current regional and global economic situation, agree on approaches to developing cooperation and determine APEC’s tasks for the coming year.

In 2018, Papua New Gunea will assume the rotating APEC chairmanship.

Presidential aide Yuri Ushakov earlier told reporters that Putin will hold a series of bilateral meetings on Novmeber 10. He is expected to meet with Vietnam’s President Tran Dai Quang, China’s President Xi Jinping, Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and the Philippines’ President Rodrigo Duterte.

He said that Putin regularly meets with the Chinese leader, adding that this time the meeting "will be all the more interesting because Xi Jinping will meet with [US President Donald] Trump today or tomorrow, and the assessments of these negotiations will be very useful to us, of course."

The Kremlin representative reported that Putin and Abe will share opinions on the current issues of Russian-Japanese cooperation and international issues, including cooperation between the two countries in the APEC and the situation on the Korean Peninsula, during their meeting.

As for the meeting between the Russian and Vietnamese presidents, Ushakov noted, in particular, that a joint statement on cooperation and provision of international information security will be taken after it.

The Kremlin official noted that Putin and Duterte are expected to discuss bolstering cooperation in the trade and economic sphere. The leaders will also touch upon current issues on the regional agenda, including within the framework of the Philippines’ chairmanship in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

Speaking about a possible meeting of Putin and Trump, Ushakov said that the two leaders will have a chance to discuss the situation in Syria and on the Korean Peninsula and bilateral relations on the sidelines of the APEC summit.

"[The two leaders] have a lot to discuss [at this meeting], including major international issues ranging from Syria to North Korea and so on," the Kremlin official said. "There are many bilateral problems, bilateral relations have reached a low point."

According to Ushakov, Moscow and Washington have not reached an agreement on the timeframe for the two president’s meeting yet.