Arab News Japan

TOKYO: The Alaska summit between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin has not reduced geopolitical uncertainty or removed the threat of further Western sanctions on Russia, according to analysts Oxford Economics (OE).

“The main economic fall-out from the summit is that Russia has managed to avoid new US sanctions for now,” OE says. “Conversely, we have seen no evidence of substantive talks on future economic cooperation or the potential removal of US sanctions. So, it’s too early to adopt a more optimistic view on the Russian economy, which we think is teetering on the brink of a recession.”

OE’s report says the biggest revelation from the summit was that President Trump appears to have abandoned his conviction that Russia needs to negotiate a ceasefire with Ukraine prior to a full peace deal. However, OE believes that Ukraine and EU leaders will try to persuade Trump to revert to his earlier demand of a ceasefire and to rekindle threats of new Russia sanctions.

OE says America’s threats to impose huge tariffs on countries buying Russian oil were ineffective, as Russia showed no signs of scaling down its summer offensive and continued its attacks on Ukraine’s cities. However, it added, if Russia had hoped that it could offer the US economic cooperation in exchange for the gradual lifting of sanctions, those hopes do not appear to have been fulfilled.

“In our view, the Alaska summit hasn’t reduced geopolitical uncertainty or removed the threat of further Western sanctions on Russia,” the report states.