Merkel, Putin form marriage of convenience forged by Trump

Bloomberg

The whirlwind tearing through international relations that is US President Donald Trump may be forcing Angela Merkel and Vladimir Putin into a marriage of convenience after years of antagonism.
On Saturday, the German chancellor hosted the Russian president at an 18th century Baroque palace near Berlin, their first bilateral meeting in Germany since before Putin’s 2014 annexation of Crimea plunged relations into crisis.
The invitation from Merkel, who’s been his most implacable critic since then, is a major breakthrough for Putin in ending Russia’s isolation and reaffirms her pivotal role in Europe despite election setbacks.
“Merkel is hedging and Putin is exploiting,” said Josef Janning, senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin.
After Trump met Putin while attacking Merkel and the German economy, “she needs to have her own contact with Putin. She doesn’t want to give up the chance of keeping Putin within a margin that is manageable for Germany.”
This is Putin’s highest profile bilateral visit to Germany since 2013, though he and Merkel have met at international events including last year’s Group of 20 summit in Hamburg.
Merkel has visited Putin in Russia several times, most recently in May.
She’s advocated engagement principally to deliver blunt messages rather than being a bridge between the European Union and Russia.

‘Many Problems’
“It’s a working meeting and one shouldn’t expect any special results,” Merkel told reporters in Berlin.
“But we’re dealing with so many problems, from Ukraine to Syria to cooperation in the economic sphere, that it is justified to keep up a permanent dialogue.”
The leaders will discuss the conflicts in Syria and Ukraine as well as “big commercial projects in the context of threats that are being made by third countries,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call.
The meeting comes after Trump last month slammed Germany as “totally controlled by Russia” because of its dependence on Moscow for natural gas supplies.
Work on a new gas pipeline linking the two countries, the Gazprom PJSC-backed Nord Stream 2, began in May amid a US threat of sanctions targeting the project.
“In a world that’s getting more and more unpredictable, we need to talk even with difficult partners like Russia,” Achim Post, a senior lawmaker for Germany’s Social Democrats, Merkel’s junior coalition partner, said in a statement.
Putin stressed the importance of Merkel’s support for Nord Stream 2 as evidence of her willingness to assert Europe’s independence, said three people who attended a recent meeting between
the president and senior diplomats.
The Kremlin views divisions between the US and Europe over trade and the Iranian nuclear deal as a chance for Russia to mend relations with Germany by presenting itself as a more reliable partner in negotiations, according to other officials, who asked not be identified discussing internal matters.