Trump says Putin ready to make deal on Ukraine as leaders prepare for Alaska meeting

MOSCOW/LONDON/KYIV - US President Donald Trump said on Aug 14 he thought Vladimir Putin was ready to make a deal on ending his war in Ukraine after the Russian president floated the prospect of a nuclear arms agreement on the eve of their summit in Alaska.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his European allies have

intensified their efforts

this week to prevent any deal between the US and Russia emerging from the Aug 15 summit that leaves Ukraine vulnerable to future attacks.

“I think he’s going to make a deal,” Mr Trump said in a Fox News radio interview, adding that if the meeting went well, he would call Mr Zelensky and European leaders afterwards, and that if it went badly, he would not.

The aim of

the Aug 15 talks

with Mr Putin is to set up a second meeting including Ukraine, Mr Trump said, adding: “I don’t know that we’re going to get an immediate ceasefire.”

Mr Putin earlier spoke to his most senior ministers and security officials as he prepared for a meeting with Mr Trump in Anchorage, Alaska, that could shape the endgame to the largest war in Europe since World War II.

In televised comments, Mr Putin said the US was “making, in my opinion, quite energetic and sincere efforts to stop the hostilities, stop the crisis and reach agreements that are of interest to all parties involved in this conflict.”

This was happening, Mr Putin said, “in order to create long-term conditions for peace between our countries, and in Europe, and in the world as a whole - if, by the next stages, we reach agreements in the area of control over strategic offensive weapons.”

His comments signalled that Russia will raise nuclear arms control as part of a wide-ranging discussion on security when he sits down with Mr Trump. A Kremlin aide said Mr Putin and Mr Trump would also discuss the “huge untapped potential” for Russia-US economic ties.

A senior Eastern European official, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said Mr Putin would try to distract Mr Trump from Ukraine at the talks by offering him possible progress on nuclear arms control or something business-related.

“We hope Trump won’t be fooled by the Russians; he understands all (these) dangerous things,” the official said, adding that Russia’s only goal was to avoid any new sanctions and have existing sanctions lifted.

‘Like a chess game’

Mr Trump said there would be a press conference after the talks, but that he did not know whether it would be joint. He also said there would be “a give and take” on boundaries and land.

“The second meeting is going to be very, very, very important. This meeting sets up like a chess game. This (first) meeting sets up a second meeting, but there is a 25 per cent chance that this meeting will not be a successful meeting,” he said.

Mr Trump said it would be up to Mr Putin and Mr Zelensky to strike an agreement, saying: “I’m not going to negotiate their deal.”

Russia controls around a fifth of Ukraine, and Mr Zelensky and the Europeans worry that a deal could cement those gains, rewarding Mr Putin for 11 years of efforts to seize Ukrainian land and emboldening him to expand further into Europe.

An EU diplomat said it would be “scary to see how it all unfolds in the coming hours. Trump had very good calls yesterday with Europe, but that was yesterday.”

Mr Trump had shown willingness to join the security guarantees for Ukraine at a last-ditch virtual meeting with European leaders and Mr Zelensky on Aug 13, European leaders said, though he made no public mention of them afterwards.

The Aug 15 summit, the first Russia-US summit since June 2021, comes at one of the toughest moments for Ukraine in a war that has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced millions since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Speaking after the Aug 13 meeting, French President Emmanuel Macron said Mr Trump had said the transatlantic Nato alliance should not be part of any security guarantees designed to protect Ukraine from future attacks in a post-war settlement.

However, Mr Trump also said the US and all willing allies should be part of the security guarantees, Mr Macron added.

Expanding on that, a European official told Reuters that Mr Trump said on the call he was willing to provide some security guarantees for Europe, without spelling out what they would be.

It “felt like a big step forward,” said the official, who did not want to be named.

It was not immediately clear what such guarantees could mean in practice.

On Aug 13, Mr Trump

threatened “severe consequences”

if Mr Putin does not agree to peace in Ukraine and has warned of economic sanctions if his meeting on Aug 15 proves fruitless.

Russia is likely to resist Ukraine and Europe’s demands and has previously said its stance had not changed since it was first detailed by Mr Putin in June 2024. REUTERS