Joe Biden touts ‘tight’ US-Europe ties as he embarks on diplomatic marathon

Joe Biden left on the first foreign trip of his presidency on Wednesday, touting the strong transatlantic alliance ahead of summits with G7, European and Nato partners before a face-to-face with Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

Boarding Air Force One outside Washington, Biden said his trip would make “clear to Putin and China that Europe and the United States are tight.”

The 78-year-old president was headed first to Britain for a G7 summit in a Cornish seaside resort from Friday to Sunday.

From there, in rapid succession, he will visit Queen Elizabeth at Windsor Castle, fly to Brussels for summits with the Nato military alliance and the European Union, then finish up in Geneva, where he meets Putin next Wednesday.

With the world still crawling out from under the wreckage of Covid-19, Biden has cast his diplomatic marathon as a return to badly needed US leadership.

But beyond the immediate challenges of boosting vaccine donations to poorer regions and reinvigorating post-pandemic economies, Biden’s agenda features the even bigger task of shoring up a somewhat-tattered group of democracies against Russia and China.