Ukraine, sidelined in Trump-Putin summit, fights Russian grab for more territory
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A Ukrainian soldier keeping a lookout for Russian drones in the back of a truck in the city of Kostyantynivka.
PHOTO: NYTIMES
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- Russian troops advanced in eastern Ukraine near Dobropillia, seeking control of the Donetsk region ahead of a Putin-Trump summit.
- Zelensky and EU allies fear Trump will pressure Ukraine to concede territory, undermining its sovereignty and violating international law.
- Trump's administration tempered ceasefire expectations, but is open to a trilateral meeting with Putin and Zelensky later in the future.
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MOSCOW/BRUSSELS – Small bands of Russian soldiers thrust deeper into eastern Ukraine on Aug 12 before a summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump, which European leaders fear could end in peace terms imposed on an unlawfully shrunken Ukraine.
In one of the most extensive incursions so far in 2025, Russian troops advanced near the coal-mining town of Dobropillya, part of Mr Putin’s campaign to take full control of Ukraine’s Donetsk region.
Ukraine’s military dispatched reserve troops, saying they were in difficult combat
Mr Trump has said any peace deal would involve “some swopping of territories to the betterment of both” Russia and Ukraine, which has up to now depended on the US as its main arms supplier.
But because all the areas being contested lie within Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky and his European Union (EU) allies fear that he will face pressure to give up far more than Russia does.
In the first US-Russia summit since 2021, Mr Putin and Mr Trump will meet on Aug 15 at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage, Alaska, two White House officials said.
Mr Trump’s administration tempered expectations on Aug 12 for major progress towards a ceasefire, calling the summit a “listening exercise”.
Along that line, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the President wanted to size up Mr Putin directly.
“The President feels like, look, I’ve got to look at this guy across the table. I need to see him face to face. I need to hear him one on one. I need to make an assessment by looking at him,” Mr Rubio told WABC radio in New York on Aug 12.
Mr Zelensky and most of his European counterparts have said a lasting peace cannot be secured without Ukraine at the negotiating table, and a deal must comply with international law, Ukraine’s sovereignty and its territorial integrity.
They will hold a virtual meeting with Mr Trump on Aug 13 to underscore those concerns before the Putin summit.
“Substantive and productive talks about us without us will not work,” Mr Zelensky said, in an interview on Aug 12 with NewsNation.
“They are possible, but they will not be accepted in practice. Just as I cannot say anything about another state or make decisions for it.”
Mr Zelensky said Russia must agree to a ceasefire before territorial issues are discussed.
He would reject any Russian proposal that Ukraine pull its troops from the eastern Donbas region
Asked why Mr Zelensky was not joining the US and Russian leaders at the Alaska summit, a White House spokeswoman said on Aug 12 that the bilateral meeting had been proposed by Mr Putin, and that Mr Trump accepted to get a “better understanding” of how to end the war.
“Only one party that’s involved in this war is going to be present, and so this is for the President to go and to get a more firm and better understanding of how we can hopefully bring this war to an end,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters.
“You need both countries to agree to a deal.”
Mr Trump is open to a trilateral meeting with Mr Putin and Mr Zelensky later, Ms Leavitt said.
Russia advances
Ukraine faces a shortage of soldiers after Russia invaded more than three years ago, easing the path for the latest Russian advances.
“This breakthrough is like a gift to Putin and Trump during the negotiations,” said Mr Sergei Markov, a former Kremlin adviser, suggesting it could increase pressure on Ukraine to yield territory under any deal.
Ukraine’s military, meanwhile, said it had retaken two villages in the eastern region of Sumy on Aug 11, part of a small reversal in more than a year of slow, attritional Russian gains in the south-east.
Russia, which launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, has mounted a new offensive in 2025 in Sumy after Mr Putin demanded a “buffer zone” there.
Ukraine and its European allies fear that Mr Trump, keen to claim credit for making peace and seal new business deals with Russia’s government, will end up rewarding Mr Putin for his 11 years spent in efforts to seize Ukrainian territory, the last three in open warfare.
European security
European leaders have said Ukraine must be capable of defending itself
“Ukraine cannot lose this war and nobody has the right to pressure Ukraine into making territorial or other concessions, or making decisions that smack of capitulation,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said at a government meeting.
“I hope we can convince President Trump about the European position.”
Mr Zelensky has said he and European leaders “all support President Trump’s determination”.
A resident on Aug 12 in front of a heavily damaged residential building in the town of Bilozerske, in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, after a Russian strike.
PHOTO: AFP
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Mr Putin’s principal ally in Europe, was the only leader not to join the EU’s statement of unity. He mocked his counterparts as “sidelined” and said Russia had already defeated Ukraine.
“The Ukrainians have lost the war. Russia has won this war,” Mr Orban told the Patriot YouTube channel in an interview.
Mr Trump had been recently hardening his stance towards Russia, agreeing to send more US weapons to Ukraine and threatening hefty trade tariffs on buyers of Russian oil in an ultimatum that has now lapsed. REUTERS
