Buenos Aires, Argentina • President Donald Trump arrived at a global summit here clouded by the Russia investigation escalating in Washington and amid a war of words with the Kremlin regarding the cancellation of his planned meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
As the leaders gathered for the opening session of the Group of 20 summit, Trump appeared cool toward some of his counterparts and was not seen acknowledging Putin, the autocrat whose interference in the 2016 presidential election is the subject of the Justice Department's far-reaching special counsel investigation.
Putin, in turn, had a friendly exchange with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, high-fiving and laughing with the kingdom’s de-facto leader who U.S. intelligence has fingered with ordering the brutal murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in October.
Trump was one of the last leaders to enter the summit site for a group photo and walked past both Putin and Mohammed without stopping to chat or shake hands. Trump, who has long had an affinity for autocrats, had drawn criticism ahead of the summit for agreeing to meet Putin and for standing by Mohammed's denials of involvement in Khashoggi's killing.
Trump interacted with Mohammed on the sidelines of the summit in what the White House characterized as having "exchanged pleasantries," though Trump insisted to reporters, "We had no discussion. We might, but we had none."
By contrast, Trump appeared to speak amicably with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe - as well as with French President Emmanuel Macron, who just two weeks ago delivered a forceful rebuke of Trump’s nationalism at a ceremony in France with the U.S. president sitting by.
Abe attempted to stroke Trump's ego, even if bending the truth.
"I would like to congratulate you on your historic victory in the midterm elections in the United States," Abe told Trump at the start of their bilateral meeting. Abe apparently was referencing Republican gains in the Senate, but ignoring the fact that Democrats seized control of the House in a national rebuke of the president.
Trump sounded an optimistic note at the outset of what he called "two very busy days" of international economic and diplomatic meetings, tweeting early Friday that "Our great Country is extremely well represented" at the summit dominated by global fears of a U.S.-China trade war.
But Thursday’s guilty plea of former Trump attorney Michael Cohen for lying to Congress about Trump’s real estate ventures in Russia cast a pall over the Buenos Aires gathering.
Trump scrapped a planned sit-down with Putin, which was to have been a centerpiece of his visit to Argentina, citing Russia's aggression in Ukraine. Last weekend, Russian naval forces rammed and fired upon Ukrainian ships off the coast of Crimea and seized three vessels and 23 sailors.
In his Thursday tweet canceling the Putin meeting, which he sent from Air Force One en route to Buenos Aires, Trump wrote, "I look forward to a meaningful Summit [with Putin] again as soon as this situation is resolved!"
The Kremlin challenged Trump's excuse.
"Is the Kiev-orchestrated Kerch provocation the true reason for canceling the meeting?" Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Friday in Moscow. "This is the explanation we hear in public, which we have taken note of. But I think one must look for answers in the domestic political situation in the United States. It dominates in terms of making decisions.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also weighed in.
"I doubt that this move will be conducive to the resolution of a whole host of important international problems. But love can't be forced, of course," Lavrov said in an interview with Russian state TV, according to the Interfax news agency.
The White House quickly countered.
"The Russian Witch Hunt Hoax, which is hopefully now nearing an end, is doing very well," White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement. "Unfortunately, it probably does undermine our relationship with Russia. However, the reason for our canceled meeting is Ukraine. Hopefully, that will be resolved soon so that productive conversations can begin."
And Trump later said Ukraine's aggression was "the sole reason" for canceling the meeting.
"We are not happy about it," Trump told reporters. "Hopefully they'll be able to settle that soon, and we look forward to meeting with President Putin. But on the basis of what took place with respect to the ships and the sailors, that is the sole reason."
Sanders also said that, contrary to some reports in Russia, there are no plans for even an informal pull-aside meeting with Putin. However, the two presidents are expected to cross paths frequently over the next two days, including perhaps at a cultural event and dinner for leaders Friday evening at the Argentine capital's fabled Teatro Colon.
Trump's schedule here - packed to bursting as outlined by aides earlier in the week - has grown lighter with the Putin cancellation. He also downgraded two other planned sessions, with the leaders of South Korea and Turkey, to brief chats on the margins of the gathering.
Trump was scheduled to sit down with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Friday afternoon, but the long-serving European leader's arrival in Argentina was delayed because her government aircraft malfunctioned. Merkel instead flew to Buenos Aires aboard a commercial flight from Spain and missed the start of the summit.
Trump celebrated a retooled North American trade agreement with a signing ceremony Friday morning.
Trump began his day on little sleep Friday, having tweeted after midnight local time about the G-20 and again little more than six hours later with complaints about special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian involvement in the 2016 election.
But he seemed cheerful as he greeted Argentine President Mauricio Macri, whom he called an old friend, and ad-libbed a fond remembrance of his days as a Manhattan real estate developer.
"I've been friends with Mauricio for a long time," he said. "I actually did business with his family, with his father. Great father, friend of mine."
Trump said the elder Macri had been involved with Trump's purchase of the West Side Yards, a large chunk of developable land along the Hudson River. Trump bought the former railroad property in 1985 for $115 million and planned to build a $4.5 billion complex called Television City. It never happened, and Trump defaulted on about $1 billion in loans in 1994. He sold a majority stake in the property and later took a profit when it was resold.
"It was a great job, successful job, very big job. One of the largest jobs in Manhattan," Trump mused Friday. "That was in my civilian days. And so I always had fond memories. Little did I know that his son would become El Presidente," Trump said. "And little did he know that I was going to become president."
But the bonhomie was interrupted later in the day when the Argentine government expressed exasperation with the White House characterization of the Trump-Macri meeting. Sanders said in a statement that the two leaders had agreed on a "shared commitment to face regional challenges" including "predatory Chinese economic activity."
Surprised Argentine officials spent part of the afternoon reassuring journalists - particularly the Chinese media - that Sanders's claim of agreement on Chinese aggression simply was not true.
"That is not the position of the Argentine government, and there was no agreement on that statement," said a senior Argentine official who spoke on the condition of anonymity given the sensitivity of the issue. "Those are the words of the U.S. government. We have a great relationship with the Chinese and we want to build on it."
"I don't know where this came from," the official continued.
Trump, meanwhile, seemed preoccupied by events at home even before he left his hotel Friday. He tweeted two sarcastic messages complaining anew that the Russia investigation is a “witch hunt.”
In major developments this week, investigators in the special counsel's investigation have publicly cast Trump as a central figure of their probe into whether the president's campaign conspired with Moscow.
A minor 3.8-magnitude earthquake shook Greater Buenos Aires on the morning of the summit, striking at 10:27 a.m. about 20 miles south of the city and not far from its main airport, Ezeiza International. No significant damage or injuries were reported, but it came as a shock in a city where earthquakes are exceedingly rare and struck some as an odd omen as the summit opened.
Trump's dinner meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Saturday is now the main attraction for his trip. Both sides have sounded open to a preliminary agreement that might avert new tariffs.
"We're working very hard," Trump told reporters. "If we can make a deal that'd be good. I think they want to. I think we'd like to." He added, "There's some good signs. We'll see what happens."
Also Friday, Trump was in the audience as Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto bestowed the Mexican Order of the Aztec Eagle, his country's highest award, on Trump's son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner. Kushner was heavily involved in negotiations for a revamped North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Kushner thanked the Mexican leader, whose last day in office is Friday.
"You have always put Mexican interests first even when it wasn't popular," Kushner said.
Kushner also praised Trump.
"Through your direction and leadership we were able to accomplish a lot of great things," he said. "While there has been a lot of tough talk, I have seen the genuine respect and care that President Trump has for Mexico and the Mexican people, and I do believe we have been able to put that in the right light."
The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA, replaces NAFTA and establishes new rules for the auto industry and digital trade, but it faces an uphill fight in Congress next year.
In his own remarks at the trade agreement signing afterward, Trump praised the Mexican leader and thanked Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, whom he had mocked during the talks, though there was an unmistakable frostiness between the American and Canadian leaders.
In contrast with Trump, who arrived in Buenos Aires only hours before the first summit meetings began, Macron was emerging as the darling of the Argentines. He arrived a day and half early and made a broad run through a city often dubbed the "Paris of South America." He dined at a traditional Argentine steak house and visited the cultural institute of the renowned Argentine author Jorge Luis Borges. He took his morning coffee at Ateneo Grand Splendid, a theater turned book store and cafe that is heralded as among the most glamorous in the world.
Cheering crowds formed outside the book store, leading the local paper Clarin to dub Macron "a rock star."
It was a visit that was organized very confidentially," the bookstore's manager, Andrea Stefanoni, told Clarin. "It was organized days ago and was very beautiful because he is a person who feels very much tied to literature."
Saudi Arabia's crown prince found a different reception here. His problems followed him all the way to the Southern Cone of South America. On Monday, Human Rights Watch filed a complaint with Argentine prosecutors asking them to examine Mohammed's alleged responsibility for the torture of Saudi citizens and human rights violations in Yemen.
Universal jurisdiction applies in Argentina, allowing crimes committed abroad by a national of any country to be investigated here. And by Wednesday, a federal prosecutor - Ramiro González - had begun making inquiries, and forwarded the case to an investigating judge.
In the meantime, Mohammed, according to Human Rights Watch and local media reports, skipped plans to stay with his 400-person delegation at the luxurious Four Seasons Hotel in Buenos Aires. Instead, he largely sheltered in the fortified Saudi Embassy here.
Argentine officials say his diplomatic immunity, plus the length of time required for any investigation, have all but ruled out any immediate action against him during the summit. But his apparent caution suggested possible concern, and that future travel plans may be marred by similar legal maneuvers.
"The decisions taken by the Argentine justice this week show that bin Salman will have to talk to his lawyers whenever he wants to leave his country. It has become clear that he is not, nor can he be, above the law," Jose Miguel Vivanco, executive director of Human Right's Watch Americas Division, wrote in an editorial in Argentina's La Nacion.
The Washington Post’s Anton Troianovski in Moscow contributed to this report.
