MOSCOW — US national security adviser John Bolton and Russian National Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev met in Geneva on Aug. 23 for the first high-level meeting of officials from the two countries since the US-Russia presidential summit in Helsinki on July 16. In between the two meeting, US President Donald Trump came under heavy criticism at home for the summit with President Vladimir Putin and because of Trump's remarks at the press conference with the Russian leader. The Helsinki meeting reignited the debate in the United States on dealing with Moscow. And a new round of US sanctions imposed following the Putin-Trump summit has helped the Russian currency, along with the overall bilateral relationship, plummet to new lows.
The Russian Foreign Ministry issued an immediate statement saying a policy of sanctions “is a road to nowhere.”