Trump and Putin had another, undisclosed conversation at G20 - BBC News
The White House and Kremlin both label media reporting of the meeting as "absolutely absurd".
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US President Donald Trump and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin had another, previously undisclosed conversation at this month's G20, the White House has confirmed.

They spoke towards the end of a formal dinner but the White House has not revealed what was discussed.

President Trump has condemned media revelations of the talks as "sick".

The two leaders' relationship is under scrutiny amid allegations of Russian interference in the US election.

US intelligence agencies believe Moscow tried to tip the election in Mr Trump's favour, something denied by Russia. Mr Trump has rejected allegations of any collusion.

The extra conversation happened during a private meal of heads of state at the G20 summit in Hamburg earlier in the month.

The Kremlin said at the time that the two leaders had had "an opportunity to continue their discussion during the dinner", but the extent of the meeting was not known.

Mr Trump left his seat and headed to Mr Putin, who had been sitting next to Mr Trump's wife, Melania, US media said. The US president was alone with Mr Putin, apart from the attendance of the Russian president's official interpreter.

Mr Trump had been seated next to Japanese PM Shinzo Abe's wife, so the US interpreter at the dinner spoke Japanese, not Russian. No media were in attendance.

Given the poor state of relations between Washington and Moscow and the controversy surrounding Russia's efforts to interfere with the US presidential campaign, each and every encounter between Mr Putin and Mr Trump is bound to be carefully scrutinised.

Thus the apparently impromptu discussion between the two men at the G20 dinner inevitably raises many questions. What was President Trump seeking to do in approaching the Russian president? Were matters of substance discussed? If so, why was no formal note taken? And why did the US president have to rely upon a Russian official for translation?

This is all highly unusual, especially at a time when relations between the two countries are laden with so many problems.

Mr Trump also appeared unaware of another dimension - the message that his tete-a-tete would send to other leaders in the room, who must have watched the US president's gambit with some unease.

Mr Trump's spokesperson Sarah Sanders told reporters at the White House on Wednesday that the dinner was part of the president's publicly released schedule.

"You guys came and took pictures of it," she told journalists. "It wasn't like this was some sort of hidden dinner. To act as if this was some secret is just absolutely absurd."

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the two leaders had "exchanged opinions and phrases in the margins of the visit on more than one occasion".

"There were no covert or secret meetings. It is absolutely absurd to claim this," he was quoted as saying by Russia's TASS news agency.

Mr Peskov also mocked the notion that the subject of a conversation between the two men could have been kept secret, saying that is a "manifestation of schizophrenia".

The length of the talks has been disputed.

Ian Bremmer, president of the US-based Eurasia Group, who first reported them in a newsletter to clients, said: "Donald Trump got up from the table and sat down with Putin for about an hour. It was very animated and very friendly."

This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. What Trump said of his first, formal meeting with Putin

No-one else was nearby, so the topics of discussion were not known, he said.

Mr Bremmer had not been at the dinner but said details were given to him by unnamed attendees who, he said, were "flummoxed, confused and startled" by the turn of events.

"At summit meetings you have little 'pull-asides' between heads of state to discuss business all the time - a one-hour pull-aside is highly unusual in any context," he told the BBC.

"A one-hour pull-aside between Putin and Trump where only the Kremlin translator is there, where we don't know what's discussed, given the uniqueness of the US-Russia relationship... makes the [US] president, surprisingly and disturbingly, not credible."

In a statement, a senior White House official said there was no "second meeting", just a brief conversation after dinner.

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The official said: "The insinuation that the White House has tried to 'hide' a second meeting is false, malicious and absurd. It is not merely perfectly normal, it is part of a president's duties, to interact with world leaders."

National Security Council spokesman Michael Anton said: "A conversation over dessert should not be characterised as a meeting."

Mr Trump later said on Twitter: "Fake News story of secret dinner with Putin is 'sick.' All G20 leaders, and spouses, were invited by the Chancellor of Germany. Press knew!"

The dinner and its attendees have always been known. Only the Trump-Putin discussion had not been reported before.

At the dinner, Mr Trump's wife, Melania, sat next to Mr Putin

At the earlier, formal meeting, their first face-to-face encounter, Mr Trump said he had repeatedly pressed Mr Putin about the allegations of interference in the US vote.

"I said, 'Did you do it?' He said, 'No, I did not, absolutely not.' I then asked him a second time, in a totally different way. He said, 'Absolutely not.'"

There are congressional investigations, and one by a special counsel, into the allegations of Russian interference in the US election and possible collusion with the Trump team.

On Tuesday, the Senate intelligence committee said it wanted to interview Mr Trump's son, Donald Jr, and other members of the Trump team, over a meeting they had with a Russian lawyer in June last year.

Mr Trump Jr said he had attended the meeting with Natalia Veselnitskaya as he was promised damaging material on Hillary Clinton, but it did not materialise.

On Wednesday, Ms Veselnitskaya told Russia's RT television channel she would be willing to testify before the Senate on the matter.

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Meanwhile, the White House said Mr Trump would nominate former Utah governor Jon Huntsman as ambassador to Russia, a key post for a president who promised to improve relations with Moscow.

Mr Huntsman, who served as ambassador to China and Singapore, needs to have his name confirmed by the Senate.

The suspicions over Russian interference are likely to play a significant factor in his confirmation process, correspondents say.