LONDON
British Prime Minister David Cameron is to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday for face-to-face talks over the crisis in Ukraine.
"It is an important opportunity to set out the importance of a dialogue between the Russian government and the new Ukrainian government," Cameron's spokesperson said in a statement Monday.
The meeting in Normandy, France, will come a day after a G7 leaders summit in Brussels from which Putin is excluded.
Cameron's office said the British premier would underline the "significance of the presidential elections that we have seen in the Ukraine, with a democratically-elected president with a strong mandate."
Pro-EU businessman and politician Petro Poroshenko claimed a landslide victory in Ukraine's presidential election on May 25 with 56 percent of the vote.
The election results represented "a clear expression of the will of the Ukrainian people," Cameron's spokesperson said.
Relations between U.K. and Russia have been strained since Prince of Wales reportedly compared Putin to Adolf Hitler. Following the alleged remarks, the Russian embassy in London demanded talks with the U.K. foreign office.
aa.com.tr/en
