Meeting goes as well as could be expected as Biden and Putin speak language of diplomacy – but hardly one of affection
Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin hadn’t even sat down before tensions boiled over at the 18th-century Villa La Grange, a fine Swiss manor house besieged on Wednesday by a 21st-century press pool. The two men looked cordial enough as they shook hands for the first time as leaders. But the sun-struck journalists behind them pushed and shouted, some knocked to the floor, as they fought to get in to the leaders’ only joint appearance of the day.
“The media scuffle was the most chaotic your pooler has seen at a presidential event in nine years,” wrote a US reporter from inside the melee, which erupted as the press pack tried to follow the two leaders into the villa. “Russian security yelled at journalists to get out and began pushing journalists. Journalists and White House officials screamed back that the Russian security should stop touching us.”
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