logo
Five things Trump and Putin may discuss in Alaska — and one they won't

Five things Trump and Putin may discuss in Alaska — and one they won't

Times17 hours ago
President Trump's summit with President Putin in Alaska will be the first meeting between the Russian leader and an American counterpart since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
When Putin launched the invasion, he gave a speech claiming that Russia was 'seeking peace'. He blamed the war on Nato encroachment in eastern Europe and said Ukraine was 'a puppet of the West'. There is little sign his views have changed in the three and a half years since.
Meanwhile, Trump returned to the White House in January promising to go down in history as a 'peacemaker'.
He appears determined to win the Nobel peace prize but has played down the chances of a significant breakthrough at his meeting with Putin in Anchorage, instead suggesting a three-way summit attended by himself, Putin and President Zelensky is more likely to end the war.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Ukraine strikes Russian ship ‘carrying ammunition from Iran' on day of Trump-Putin summit
Ukraine strikes Russian ship ‘carrying ammunition from Iran' on day of Trump-Putin summit

The Independent

time23 minutes ago

  • The Independent

Ukraine strikes Russian ship ‘carrying ammunition from Iran' on day of Trump-Putin summit

Ukraine has struck a large Russian oil refinery and key port, hitting a ship that had been transporting drone parts and ammunition from Iran, its military has confirmed. Kyiv said on Friday that Ukraine struck the Syzran oil refinery in Russia 's Samara region in an overnight attack and also hit the Caspian Sea port of Olya in the Astrakhan region the previous day, including the cargo vessel travelling to Russia. The strikes came hours before US president Donald Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin meet for a crucial summit in Alaska to discuss the war in Ukraine – to which Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has not been invited – and as Russia grinds out gains in Ukraine's east. Facing regular Russian missile and drone attacks, Ukraine has directed the majority of its deep strikes against Russian oil refineries and unspecified 'storage facilities' this year, according to new general staff data published on Friday. The Ukrainian military, as usual, did not confirm if it used drones for its latest two long-range attacks. It says its deep strike campaign aims to degrade Russia's capacity to wage the full-scale war it launched in February 2022. The Ukrainian military's claims could not be independently verified. In a statement on the Telegram messaging app, Kyiv's military said its strike caused a fire and explosions at the Syzran refinery, which it said produces a range of fuels and is one of the biggest in oil company Rosneft's network. Samara's regional governor said a drone attack caused a fire at an unspecified "industrial enterprise" in his region, but that it had been put out quickly. The Russian defence ministry said it had shot down Ukrainian drones over nine regions. The Ukrainian military also said it struck the Caspian port of Olya in Russia's Astrakhan region on Thursday, hitting a ship that had been transporting drone parts and ammunition from Iran. The vessel "Port Olya-4" regularly transits the Caspian Sea, bringing cargo between Iran and Russia, according to the US treasury department and Ukrainian military intelligence. Russia uses the Olya port as an important logistics hub for the supply of military goods from Iran, the Ukrainian military said in a statement on Friday. Meanwhile, Moscow's forces breached Ukrainian lines in a series of infiltrations in the country's industrial heartland of Donetsk this week. The advances amount to only a limited success for Russia, analysts say, since it still needs to consolidate its gains before achieving a true breakthrough – but it is still seen as a potentially dangerous moment for Ukraine. In other developments, Russian strikes in Ukraine's Sumy region overnight on Wednesday resulted in numerous injuries, Ukrainian regional officials said. A missile strike on a village in the Seredyna-Budska community wounded a 7-year-old girl and a 27-year-old man, according to regional governor Oleh Hryhorov. The girl was taken to hospital in a stable condition. In Russia, a Ukrainian drone attack damaged several apartment buildings in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don, near the border with Ukraine, where 13 civilians were wounded, according to acting governor of the region, Yuri Slyusar. Two of the wounded were hospitalised in serious condition, he said.

Pete Hegseth does believe in a woman's right to vote, Pentagon says after video controversy
Pete Hegseth does believe in a woman's right to vote, Pentagon says after video controversy

The Independent

time23 minutes ago

  • The Independent

Pete Hegseth does believe in a woman's right to vote, Pentagon says after video controversy

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth does believe in a woman's right to vote, the Pentagon has insisted, a week after he ignited a controversy by posting a video on X of a Christian evangelist suggesting that right should be repealed. Hegseth, 45, posted a seven-minute CNN segment on his account last Friday profiling Christian nationalist pastor Doug Wilson, who founded the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches and whose congregation the secretary belongs to, with the comment: 'All of Christ for All of Life.' The video features a brief interlude in which journalist Pamela Brown also interviews two other pastors, Toby Sumpter and Jared Longshoreman, in which the latter expresses his support for scrapping the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which granted American women suffrage in 1920 after a fierce campaign by contemporary feminists. 'I would support it on the basis that the atomization that comes with our current system is not good for humans,' Longshoreman states. Hegseth's post attracted a swathe of withering responses and personal attacks, one of which quoted the fourth president, James Madison's famous remark of 1803: 'The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe in blood for centuries.' Asked about the clip by reporters on Thursday, Pentagon spokesperson Kingsley Wilson said: 'Of course, the secretary thinks that women should have the right to vote.' She declined to be drawn on why he had felt compelled to post it. 'He appreciates many of [Pastor Wilson's] writings and teachings,' the spokesperson said. 'I'm not going to litigate every single aspect of what he may or may not believe in a certain video.' Hegseth is mentioned in the segment as an attendee at Wilson's services and over his introduction of monthly prayer sessions at the Pentagon. In the film, Brown also interviews Jennifer Butler, founder of the progressive Faith in Democracy group, who expresses disquiet about Wilson's close connection to the Donald Trump administration via the defense secretary. 'He is rapidly gaining in power,' she warned. 'He has hundreds of churches established around the country. They actually literally want to take over towns and cities and they have access to this administration.' Wilson himself is forthcoming in the film about his opinion, which he insists is based on scripture, that women should not be in certain leadership positions, and doubles down on a claim he first made in the 1990s that the relationship between masters and slaves in 19th-century America was often affectionate and not necessarily adversarial. According to The Huffington Post, Hegseth's views on women 'drove tension' while he was a student at Princeton.

University of Alaska dorms to host up to 750 Russian delegates in town for Trump-Putin summit
University of Alaska dorms to host up to 750 Russian delegates in town for Trump-Putin summit

The Independent

time23 minutes ago

  • The Independent

University of Alaska dorms to host up to 750 Russian delegates in town for Trump-Putin summit

The University of Alaska Anchorage is expecting hundreds of Russian delegates who are in the city for the summit between President Trump and President Vladimir Putin to stay in student dorms. 'There may be up to 750 people staying on campus between the U.S. and Russian delegations,' vice chancellor Ryan Buchholdt said in an email to the Alaskan newspaper, Anchorage Daily News. The school can house around 12,000 people. This week marks the start of the school calendar for those returning from the summer break. The summit is going to be held at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, about a 10-minute drive from Anchorage, reports Alaska's News Source. The meeting will mark the first time Trump and Putin have met in person since 2018. 'In addition to the dorms, we do have the Alaska Airlines Center [a sports arena that has a 5,000-seat capacity] that has been set up with beds, meeting most of the need, mostly from the Russian delegation side,' Buchholdt also told Alaska's News Source. University police are working closely with state and federal law agencies to monitor security, Buchholdt added. 'Our main concern is making sure anyone who is staying on campus, whether they are from the United States or Russia or any other locality, is safe,' Buchholdt said, 'and is able to do the mission that they're here to do and go back home safely.' On Thursday, some of the delegates had already arrived as of Thursday afternoon, according to university spokesperson Katie Bender. Flight tracking data showed that at least one flight from Moscow had touched down in Anchorage that afternoon. 'The delegations are in separate locations. For security purposes, we are not able to share where the delegations are located,' Bender added. Alyeska resort, located about 40 miles south of Anchorage, informed local press that they were fully booked for the weekend, and the website of the local hotel, Captain Cook, was also fully booked. The hotel site showed one remaining room in a hostel, at a staggeringly raised price of $150 a night on Friday. Town mayor Suzanne LaFrance explained that finding accommodation at the height of the tourist season is hard enough as it is, let alone with a significant political event taking center stage. 'I know that people are looking at creative solutions. I don't have any specific details about that [housing delegations in UOA], but I know that the university is engaged in those conversations, and I'm optimistic that we'll come up with some options for folks,' she said to Alaska's News Source. At the Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, news and camera crews were seen rolling in on Thursday morning. Locals watched on as officials gathered in the vicinity. 'It's kind of a big deal, I mean, do we all want World War III?' one man told Alaska's News Source. The two leaders will hold peace talks regarding the future of Russia and Ukraine, amid a deadly war that has killed hundreds of thousands of soldiers on both sides. Earlier on Thursday, Putin praised Trump's 'energetic and sincere efforts to stop' the war in Ukraine. More than a million Russian troops have been killed or injured since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine began on 24 February 2022, reports the British Ministry of Defense. Meanwhile, Ukrainian personnel fatalities and casualties have amounted to around 400,000, says the US-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies. Ahead of the summit, Trump vowed that as he hopes to secure a ceasefire deal.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store