U.S. Ambassador to Russia Jon Huntsman on Sunday declined to call President Trump’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin “a summit,” adding he wasn’t sure whether the possibility of extraditing 12 Russian military officials who allegedly hacked Democratic emails and servers would be broached during the unstructured discussions between the two leaders.
“You don’t know what will come out of this meeting, but it will be the first opportunity for these presidents to actually sit down across the table alone and then with their teams to talk about everything from meddling in the elections to areas where we have shared interests,” Huntsman said during an interview on NBC News’ “Meet the Press.”
WATCH: U.S. Amb. to Russia Jon Huntsman says the Trump-Putin meeting “isn’t a summit” #MTP #IfItsSunday@jonhuntsman: “You don’t know what’s going to come out of this meeting” with Putin pic.twitter.com/joxTHwEo3f
— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) July 15, 2018
With regard to the Kremlin-linked hackings, Huntsman said Russians needed to be held accountable but he couldn’t comment on details of a potential extradition arrangement in the absence of a formal treaty.
“Requests can be made, that doesn’t necessarily mean that the Russians are going to follow through with it,” he said. “I don’t know if he’ll make the ask. But it may be part of the agenda. It may be part of their bilateral meeting together. We’ll have to see.”
Special counsel Robert Mueller on Friday issued an indictment in federal court alleging 12 Russian officials “engaged in a sustained effort” to break into computers owned by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the Democratic National Committee, and Hillary Clinton’s campaign in the lead-up to the 2016 election.
Trump is meeting Putin on July 16 in Helsinki, Finland.
