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US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin will have their first face-to-face meeting during the G20 summit in Germany, but Mr Trump is under pressure at home to take a tough line with the Kremlin amid ongoing election interference allegations.
During his presidential campaign, Mr Trump praised Mr Putin as a "strong leader" with whom he would like to reset tense US-Russian relations.
But allegations of Russian meddling in last year's US election have alarmed both Republican and Democratic lawmakers and foreign policy experts say the ongoing investigations will not be far from the minds of watching political commentators.
The pair will sit down to an extended, official bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit, the White House and the Kremlin have confirmed, rather than a brief and informal pull-aside conversation.
Former national security aide in the Obama administration Julie Smith said the optics of such a meeting were fraught with risk.
"If [Trump] smiles, if he wraps his arm around Putin, if he says, 'I'm honoured to meet you, we're going to find a way forward,' ... I think Congress is going to react extremely negatively to that," she said.
Foreign policy experts said the appointment of a special counsel investigating potential links between the Russian government and members of the Trump campaign had weakened the President's ability to manoeuvrer with Russia.
Steve Pifer, a long-time State Department official focused on US-Russia relations, said Mr Trump would not be able to make meaningful progress with Russia until he confronted Mr Putin about the suspected election meddling.
"[Mr Trump] really has to raise the Russian election hacking last year, and has to say something like, 'Vladimir, don't do this again. There will be consequences'."
The US intelligence community has concluded Russia sponsored hacking of Democratic Party groups last year to benefit Mr Trump over his Democratic challenger Hillary Clinton.
Russia has denied those allegations while Mr Trump has repeatedly dismissed the idea of any coordination between his campaign and Russia as a "witch hunt", heightening speculation about the potential impact from his coming encounter with the Russian leader.
'Continued aggression by Russia is unacceptable'
Politicians on both sides of US politics have pushed to extend tough sanctions placed on Russia following its 2014 annexation of Crimea, a peninsula belonging to Ukraine.
Others, including Republican Senator Cory Gardner, have voiced concerns Russia has prolonged the civil war in Syria by backing its President Bashar al-Assad, a strongman whose forces have used chemical weapons against insurgents and civilians.
The chaos has fuelled instability in the region and a flood of migrants to Europe.
"President [Trump] needs to make it clear that the continued aggression by Russia around the globe ... is unacceptable, and that they will be held accountable," said Mr Gardner, who was among six lawmakers invited by the White House last month to discuss foreign policy with Mr Trump over dinner.
Reuters/AP
Topics: world-politics, us-elections, united-states, russian-federation, germany
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