Putin Sends Top Negotiator to Washington to Salvage Relations with Trump

After Donald Trump’s abrupt turn, imposing sanctions on Rosneft and Lukoil and canceling summit with Putin, the Kremlin urgently dispatched a key negotiator on Ukraine to the US. Kirill Dmitriev, head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund, who had been establishing connections with Trump during his first presidential term, flew to Washington on Friday, as reported by CNN citing sources familiar with the situation. Dmitriev, who has ties to Putin through family connections and is married to a close friend of his youngest daughter, Ekaterina Tikhonova, will hold talks with Trump administration officials to “discuss the future of Russian-American relations,” a CNN source said.