International Online Desk<\/p>\n
The high-stakes meeting between US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart President Vladimir Putin was billed as a vital step towards peace in the Ukraine war.<\/p>\n
But with no ceasefire and an invitation to Moscow, the almost three-hour meeting between the two leaders has yielded more questions than answers.<\/p>\n
Here are five key takeaways from the Alaska summit.<\/p>\n
Putin welcomed back on world stage with red carpet<\/p>\n
When President Vladimir Putin landed back onto the world stage on Friday, the skies in Alaska were cloudy. Waiting with a red carpet spread across the tarmac of the Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson was US President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n
As Putin approached, Trump clapped. The two leaders warmly shook hands and smiled.<\/p>\n
It was a remarkable moment for Putin \u2013 a leader who most Western nations have shunned since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. His international travel has since been largely limited to nations friendly to the Russian Federation, such as North Korea and Belarus.<\/p>\n
The fact that the Alaska summit happened at all was a victory for Putin. But this welcome would have surpassed the Kremlin\u2019s wildest dreams. In a short six months Putin went from being a pariah in the eyes of the West to being welcomed on US soil like a partner and friend.<\/p>\n
To cap it off, in an apparently unscripted moment, Putin decided to accept a lift to the airbase in Trump\u2019s armoured limousine instead of driving in his own Moscow-plated presidential state car.<\/p>\n
As the vehicle pulled away, the cameras zoomed in on Putin, sitting in the backseat and laughing.<\/p>\n
Putin faced with questions he never gets asked<\/p>\n
In his 25 years as Russian president, Putin has achieved complete control over the media, crushing journalistic freedoms and replacing information with propaganda. Within Russia he doesn\u2019t often \u2013 if ever \u2013 come up against unfriendly reporters.<\/p>\n
Yet it was only minutes after landing in Alaska that one journalist shouted in his direction: \u201cWill you stop killing civilians?\u201d If the question bothered him, he didn\u2019t show it, appearing instead to shrug and diverting his gaze.<\/p>\n
During a brief and somewhat chaotic photo op, more questions were shouted, including one in Russian about whether Putin would be ready to meet President Volodymyr Zelensky for a trilateral summit. Again, there was no obvious reaction from the Russian president beyond a cryptic smirk.<\/p>\n
What was said when talks ended earlier than expected<\/p>\n
The world\u2019s media gathered in the room with Putin and Trump had been led to expect a press conference; instead, the two leaders gave statements and took no questions from reporters.<\/p>\n
Unusually, Putin was the first to speak. He praised the \u201cconstructive atmosphere of mutual respect\u201d of the \u201cneighbourly\u201d talks, and then launching into a condensed history of Alaska\u2019s past as a Russian territory.<\/p>\n
As Putin spoke, Trump stood in silence. It was several minutes before the Russian president mentioned what he called the \u201csituation in Ukraine\u201d \u2013 ostensibly the catalyst for the summit. When he did, it was to state that although an unspecified \u201cagreement\u201d had been reached, the \u201croot causes\u201d of the conflict had to be eliminated before peace could be achieved.<\/p>\n
The phrase will have set off alarm bells in Kyiv and beyond. Since the start of the war it has become shorthand for a series of intractable and maximalist demands that Putin say stand in the way of a ceasefire.<\/p>\n
They include recognition of Russian sovereignty over the Ukrainian regions of Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson as well as Ukraine agreeing to demilitarisation, neutrality, no foreign military involvement and new elections. Essentially, they amount to capitulation \u2013 unacceptable to Kyiv, but clearly \u2013 even after three and a half years of bloody conflict \u2013 still paramount to Moscow.<\/p>\n
With this, it was clear that there was no deal.<\/p>\n
And what was not said<\/p>\n
Extraordinarily \u2013 given the context and the premise for the summit \u2013 when it was Trump\u2019s turn to speak he did not mention Ukraine or the possibility of a ceasefire once. The closest he came to referencing the conflict was saying that \u201cfive, six, seven thousand people a week\u201d are killed and noting that Putin too wanted to see an end to the bloodshed.<\/p>\n
The usually loquacious Trump seemed to have less to say than Putin. His statement was notable for its relative, and unusual, brevity \u2013 but primarily for its vagueness. \u201cThere were many, many points that we agreed on,\u201d Trump said, adding that \u201cgreat progress\u201d had been made in an \u201cextremely productive meeting\u201d.<\/p>\n
But he did not share any details and it did not appear that any concrete steps taken towards a resolution of the Ukrainian conflict. No major agreements or a trilateral meeting with President Zelensky were announced.<\/p>\n
And \u2013 to Moscow\u2019s relief \u2013 there was no mention of any \u201csevere consequences\u201d that Trump threatened would follow if a ceasefire wasn\u2019t reached.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe didn\u2019t get there,\u201d Trump admitted.<\/p>\n
Then, optimistically though vaguely, he added: \u201cBut we have a very good chance of getting there.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018Next time in Moscow\u2019 \u2013 Putin makes rare aside in English<\/p>\n
The summit may have failed to yield any tangible progress towards peace in Ukraine, but it cemented the rapprochement between Russia and the US.<\/p>\n
Pictures of the two presidents repeatedly shaking hands and grinning travelled far and wide on social media \u2013 as did images of American servicemen kneeling as they rolled out the red carpet at the foot of Putin\u2019s plane.<\/p>\n
Before wrapping up his statement, Putin referenced one of the US president\u2019s frequent talking points \u2013 that the conflict in Ukraine would have never started had Trump been in power.<\/p>\n
Despite Trump\u2019s assertion of \u201cgreat progress\u201d, nothing of substance was unveiled at the Alaska summit \u2013 yet the two leaders left the door open for another meeting, this time on Russian soil. \u201cI\u2019ll probably see you again very soon,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n
Rounding off a joint statement where he had to make no promises, no concessions and no compromises, Putin may have felt at ease enough to break into English \u2013 a rare occurrence. Chuckling, he looked at Trump and said: \u201cNext time in Moscow.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, that\u2019s an interesting one,\u201d Trump said. \u201cI\u2019ll get a little heat on that one, but I \u2013 I could see it possibly happening.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
International Online Desk The high-stakes meeting between US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart President Vladimir Putin was billed as a vital step towards peace in the Ukraine war. But with no ceasefire and an invitation to Moscow, the almost three-hour meeting between the two leaders has yielded more questions than answers. Here are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":64775,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-64774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-4","category-14"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64774","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=64774"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64774\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":64776,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64774\/revisions\/64776"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/64775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=64774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=64774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=64774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}