Washington

A US Navy destroyer on June 11 crossed the Bosphorus and entered the Black Sea, Turkey's Anadolu state news agency reported, as tensions simmer around Ukraine.

The crossing by the USS Laboon was reported as U.S. President Joe Biden met Western leaders at the G7 summit in England.

The airspace over Geneva during the summit of Russian and U.S. leaders, scheduled for 16 June, may be closed for civil aviation, the spokesman for the Swiss Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport said on Tuesday as Switzerland is preparing to monitor the airspace, Swiss media report.

President Joe Biden will on June 10 announce a "historic" U.S. donation of half a billion COVID-19 vaccine doses for 92 poorer countries, the White House said.

Ankara is approaching an upcoming meeting between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his U.S. counterpart, Joe Biden, with a positive agenda, and Turkey is receiving similar signals from Washington, Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said on June 9.

US President Joe Biden set out on his first overseas trip on Wednesday, his European trip will culminate in talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva on June 16. Biden's Air Force One left Joint Base Andrews located just outside of Washington and headed to the UK. The US leader is expected to land at RAF Mildenhall situated around 100 kilometers away from London.

US President Joe Biden speaks in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington, June 2, 2021. Photo: EPA-EFE/Samuel Corum/POOL

By George Gilson

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared at a meeting of his AK Parti that he is not about to back down from Turkey's unswerving positions on the Southeastern Mediterranean or other issues in his crucial talks with US President Joe Biden on the sidelines of the 14 June NATO Summit.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said his country doesn't have "excessive expectations or illusions" about a possible breakthrough at the upcoming summit between President Vladimir Putin and U.S. counterpart Joe Biden.

Joe Biden departs Washington early on June 9 on the first foreign trip of his presidency, launching an intense series of summits with G7, European and NATO partners before a tense face-to-face with Russia's Vladimir Putin.

Biden, 78, heads from the White House first to Britain ahead of a G7 summit in a Cornish seaside resort from Friday to Sunday.

Participants fo the EU-US summit to be held in Brussels on June 15, will announce the creation of a trans-Atlantic "structured dialogue" in order to coordinate Washington and Brussels' policies with regard to Russia, a diplomatic source told TASS.

The EU external action service refused to give any official comment about the information.