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Clinton Meets Russian, Vietnamese Leaders
U.S. President Bill Clinton met with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Vietnamese President Tran Duc Luong on Wednesday on the sidelines of the current United Nations Millennium Summit.
Clinton's meeting with Putin, the third between the two presidents over the past three months, began shortly before 15:30 GMT in the Waldorf-Astoria hotel, where Clinton is staying in New York.
The two leaders posed for photos and shook hands without making any comments to the press.
The U.S. national security adviser, Samuel Berger, said that the two leaders would discuss regional issues including the Korean peninsula, the Balkans, the Middle East and Afghanistan as well as strategic cooperation, disarmament and continued nuclear weapons nonproliferation.
"Particularly alarming are the plans of militarization of outer space," Putin said, in reference to U.S. plans for a national missile defense shield.
Clinton's decision last week to delay decision on the deployment of the missile shield helps to assuage some of the Russian leader's misgivings about further space-related talks.
Prior to his arrival in New York Sunday, Putin said that Washington and Moscow continued to hold different opinions about the anti-ballistic missile treaty signed in 1972.
Earlier, Clinton met with the Vietnamese president and the two sides held talks on trade and visit.
Clinton reaffirmed his support for a trade agreement with Vietnam and discussed the possibility of a visit to the southeast Asian nation during a brief chat with the Vietnamese president.
White House spokesman Jack Siewert said that Clinton met Luong for some 10 minutes on the sidelines of the U.N. Millennium Summit, the largest gathering of world leaders to discuss the U.N. role in the 21st century.
"It is primarily focused on the bilateral trade agreement," Siewert said. "We reaffirmed our commitment to that trade deal, recognizing there is very little time left in this congressional session," he said.
Vietnam and the United States signed a landmark trade deal earlier this year. The agreement needs to be ratified by the U.S. Congress and officials have said it is unlikely this will occur in the few weeks left in the congressional session.
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