Surface Tensions News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Lenore Manderson’s profile on The Conversation

>> yeah. there were the fringe tensions and the surface tensions in this relationship which, you know, president putin has been keen, you know, to calm down because, you know, he also wants to sort of -- i've used this metaphor before to put the brake on the runaway train that's the u.s.-russia relationship. there's been so many sanctions piled on the country for so many issues and it's had an impact on the economy. he's got parliamentary elections coming up in a couple of months from now. he doesn't want that to intensify any further. the problem is this whole idea of sort of threatening vlad...

Both the u.s. and russia want to resurrect that deal, if popular. >> that's one area, climate change is another area that they've discussed. but this is a process that will continue. there are these surface tensions which they can address. we've spoken previously about the exchange of ambassadors. neither country has an ambassador in each other's country at the moment. that could come out in this summit. but another thing, prisoner swaps. it's a really emotional area. there are american prisoners in russian jails. the americans want them back. but in exchange for that, they'll have to give the...

>> that may be good politics. what's the impact on the country, though? >> i think, you know, the real issue, as we saw in the white house briefing today, is a lot of people feel it's not really getting discussed. it's all the surface tensions and the questions about whether the president understands the full dimensions of this. as you pointed out, the white house clearly thinks this is a good political i for trump. otherwise, he would not keep coming back to it. you have to wonder if some of the competitive districts and the philadelphia suburbs, wil people remember this in november? will the...

Of course there is the energy trade that we have role they played in the global economy and our role in protecting that. although america is becoming more and more oil independent. it's a one world economy which hugely depends on oil. military hardware. i could go down the list. but those fundamentals are still there even though there are a lot of surface tensions right now. >> chris jansing, the white house has said this is not a snub, but then there are high level officials from saudi arabia coming to the summit. but more broadly, how concerned is the white house about the gulf state's prote...