Trump will seek to squeeze Ukraine ceasefire deal out of Putin at Alaska summit

Reuters

21 hours ago

MOSCOW, Aug 15 (Reuters) - Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin hold talks in Alaska on Friday, focused on the U.S. president's push to seal a ceasefire deal on Ukraine but with a last-gasp offer from Putin of a possible face-saving nuclear accord on the table too.
The meeting of the Russian and U.S. leaders at a Cold War-era air force base in Alaska will be their first face-to-face talks since Trump returned to the White House. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who was not invited to the talks, and his European allies fear Trump might sell Kyiv out and try to force it into territorial concessions.
Trump is pressing for a truce in the 3-1/2-year-old war that would bolster his credentials as a global peacemaker worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize.
For Putin, the summit is a big win before it even starts as he can use it to say that years of Western attempts to isolate Russia have unravelled and that Moscow has been returned to its rightful place at the top table of international diplomacy. He has also long been keen to talk to Trump face-to-face without Ukraine.
The White House said the summit will take place at 11 a.m. Alaska time (1900 GMT).
Trump, who once said he would end Russia's war in Ukraine within 24 hours, conceded on Thursday that the conflict, Europe's biggest land war since World War Two, had proven a tougher nut to crack than he had thought.
He said that if his talks with Putin went well, quickly setting up a subsequent three-way summit with Zelenskiy would be even more important than his encounter with Putin.
One source close to the Kremlin said there were signs that Moscow could be ready to strike a compromise on Ukraine. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, a veteran of Russian diplomacy and part of its Alaska delegation, said Moscow never revealed its hand beforehand.
Ukraine and its European allies were heartened by a call on Wednesday in which they said Trump had agreed Ukraine must be involved in any talks about ceding land. Zelenskiy said Trump had also supported the idea of security guarantees for Kyiv.
Putin, whose war economy is showing some signs of strain, needs Trump to help Russia break out of its straitjacket of ever-tightening Western sanctions, or at the very least for him not to hit Moscow with more sanctions, something the U.S. president has threatened.
The day before the summit, the Russian president held out the prospect of something else he knows Trump wants - a new nuclear arms control agreement to replace the last surviving one, which is due to expire in February next year.
Trump said on the eve of the summit that he thought Putin would do a deal on Ukraine, but he has blown hot and cold on the chances of a breakthrough. Putin, meanwhile, praised what he called "sincere efforts" by the U.S. to end the war.
The source close to the Kremlin told Reuters it looked as if the two sides had been able to find some common ground.
"Apparently, some terms will be agreed upon ... because Trump cannot be refused, and we are not in a position to refuse (due to sanctions pressure)," said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the matter's sensitivity.
They forecast that both Russia and Ukraine would be forced to make uncomfortable compromises.
Putin has so far voiced stringent conditions for a full ceasefire, but one compromise could be a truce in the air war.
Analysts say Putin could try to look like he's giving Trump what he wants while remaining free to escalate.
"If they (the Russians) are able to put a deal on the table that creates some kind of a ceasefire but that leaves Russia in control of those escalatory dynamics, does not create any kind of genuine deterrence on the ground or in the skies over Ukraine... that would be a wonderful outcome from Putin's perspective," said Sam Greene, director of Democratic Resilience at the Center for European Policy Analysis.
Zelenskiy has accused Putin of playing for time to avoid U.S. secondary sanctions and has ruled out formally handing Moscow any territory.
Trump has said land transfers could be a possible way of breaking the logjam.
Putin, whose forces control nearly one fifth of Ukraine, wants to start reviving the shrunken economic, political and business ties with the U.S. and, ideally, for the U.S. to decouple that process from Ukraine.
But it is unclear whether Putin is willing to compromise on Ukraine. In power for a quarter of a century, the Kremlin chief has staked his legacy on securing something he can sell at home as a victory.
Chief among his war aims is complete control over the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine, which comprises the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. Despite steady advances, around 25% of Donetsk remains beyond Russian control.
Putin also wants full control of Ukraine's Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions; NATO membership to be taken off the table for Kyiv; and limits on the size of Ukraine's armed forces.
Ukraine has said these terms are tantamount to asking it to capitulate.