Editor’s Note: The following are U.S. President Barack Obama’s remarks about Ukraine, starting at the 14-minute mark and lasting for 90 seconds, at his G20 press conference on September 5 in Hangzhou, China.
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Significant sticking points remain in the negotiations over a creation of an unlikely U.S.
President Barack Obama threatened Monday to call off a planned meeting with new Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, seeking distance from a US ally’s leader during a diplomatic tour that’s put Obama in close quarters with a cast of contentious world figures. “We haven’t yet closed the gap”. Obama said “we have deep commitments” to account for those lost during the war.
It follows equally unsuccessful talks between Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and US Secretary of State John Kerry. The agreement strongly depended on the opposing sides agreeing to military management being sharpened in order to clamp down on extremist groups that are operating in Syria.
Obama has expressed skepticism that Russian Federation would hold to its agreement. In recent days, the State Department has said it only wants a nationwide ceasefire between Assad’s military and the rebels, and not another “cessation of hostilities” that is time-limited and only stops fighting in some cities and regions.
“This is my proposal to Mr Putin and Mr Obama”.
US authorities are also said to be investigating the hack of another Democratic Party organization, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Putin has denied his government was involved, but cheered the release of the information. He said he had discussed the topic of cybersecurity norms with Putin and earlier with some other countries, and is already seeing some willingness from a lot of countries to adopt the rules, though it will have to be seen whether they are following them.
State Department officials have declined to elaborate on what the sticking points are preventing a deal, though the USA official said the remaining differences revolved around how the plan would be implemented.
The hard diplomacy on Syria set the tone for an uneven few days for Obama on his last tour through Asia as president.
In either case, it’s doubtful that a speech, or even a high-level agreement between the main players like China, Russia, Germany, the United Kingdom and the U.S. would have much of an impact on the way things are going.
Negotiators failed to work through differences, and the talks have ended for now.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday he had proposed, to the U.S. and Russian Federation, the setting up of a no-fly zone in northern Syria, after Ankara-backed fighters pushed the Islamic State group from the border area.
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President Barack Obama says he has asked his staff to assess whether it would be productive for him to meet with Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte.
