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16th August 2025
10:00am BST
After months of disagreements and tension over the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump finally met in the US state of Alaska yesterday.
Ukraine has been in a state of crisis for over three years after Putin's Russian military forces invaded the Eastern European nation without provocation in February 2022.
When elected as US President last November, Trump said he would end the war on day one, but no such agreement has yet materialised.
A four hour meeting between the two leaders in Anchorage, Alaska was followed up by a press conference where Trump and Putin gave differing impressions of the outcome of their discussions.
While Putin suggested that the two had reached some "agreements" on ending the war — adding that there should be "optimism" over the situation and added that Russia does want to end the war — Trump simply responded to reporters with: “There’s no deal until there’s a deal.”
Speaking via a translator, Putin then said: "I agree with President Trump, as he has said today, that naturally, the security of Ukraine should be ensured as well.
“Naturally we are prepared to work on that, I would like to hope that the agreement that we've reached together will help us bring closer that goal and will pave the path towards peace in Ukraine.
“We expect that Kyiv and European capitals will perceive that constructively and that they won't throw a wrench in the works."
Putin then warned other European nations against "backroom dealings to conduct provocations to torpedo the nascent progress.”
The 72-year-old also stressed that there were certain conditions that are required to ensure peace from a Russian perspective.
Putin said any peace deal must "consider all legitimate concerns of Russia and to reinstate a just balance of security in Europe and in world on the whole.”
Analysts have suggested Putin was referring to an avoidance of Ukraine ever becoming a member of either the EU or NATO.
Trump immediately threw Putin's suggestion into doubt, by saying that any agreement on Ukrainian peace would require consulation from other parties, most importantly of all, with Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Trump said there were “many points that we agreed on” while there were still “a couple of big ones that we haven't quite gotten there.”
He said he would be “calling up … the various people that I think are appropriate,” before reaching any final agreement.
Just this morning it has been announced that Donald Trump will meet with Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Washington on Monday.
