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The Russia-US summit in Alaska has formally wrapped up after the talks between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart, Donald Trump, and a joint press conference.
The two leaders issued statements to the press but did not take questions.
The negotiations at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson mainly focused on finding a resolution to the Ukraine conflict. While no concrete deal was announced, the two sides agreed to further pursue a resolution of the hostilities. Putin stressed that for a lasting settlement to the conflict, all of its root causes must be addressed and the legitimate concerns of Russia taken into account, RT reported.
Trump highlighted that the key takeaway from the meeting is that a promising opportunity to achieve peace has emerged. He also expressed his desire to meet with Putin again soon, noting that the Russian president shares his goal of ending the conflict.
“We have very thorough negotiations that were quite useful,” Putin said, according to the transcript of his translated speech published by CBS News. “I would like to thank once again my American counterpart, for the proposal to travel out here to Alaska. It only makes sense that we've met here, because our countries, though separated by the oceans, are close neighbors.”
The Russian President added, “We see the strive of the administration and President Trump personally to help facilitate the resolution of the Ukrainian conflict, and his strive to get to the crux of the matter, to understand this history, is precious. As I've said, the situation in Ukraine has to do with fundamental threats to our security. Moreover, we've always considered the Ukrainian nation, and I've said it multiple times, a brotherly nation. How strange it may sound in these conditions. We have the same roots, and everything that's happening is a tragedy for us, and terrible wound. Therefore, the country is sincerely interested in putting an end to it. At the same time, we're convinced that in order to, to make the settlement lasting and long term, we need to eliminate all the primary roots, the primary causes of that conflict, and we've said it multiple times, to consider all legitimate concerns of Russia and to reinstate a just balance of security in Europe and in the world on the whole, and agree with President Trump, as he has said today, that naturally, the security of Ukraine should be ensured as well. Naturally, we are prepared to work on that. I would like to hope that the agreement that we've reached together will help us bring closer that goal and will pave the path towards peace in Ukraine. We expect that Kyiv and European capitals will perceive that constructively and that they won't throw a wrench in the works. They will not make any attempts to use some backroom dealings to conduct provocations to torpedo the nascent progress.”
Trump expressed hope to have another meeting with Putin soon.
“That was very profound, and I will say that I believe we had a very productive meeting. There were many, many points that we agreed on, most of them, I would say, a couple of big ones that we haven't quite gotten there, but we've made some headway. So there's no deal until there's a deal,” Trump said, according to a transcript by CBS News. “I will call up NATO in a little while, I will call up the various people that I think are appropriate, and I'll of course, call up President Zelenskyy and tell him about today's meeting. It's ultimately up to them. They're going to have to agree with what Marco and Steve and some of the great people from the Trump administration who've come here, Scott and John Ratcliffe.”
“Next time in Moscow,” Putin told Trump in English in the end of the joint press conference. “Oh, that’s an interesting one,” Trump replied. “I’ll get a little heat on that one but I can see it possibly happening.”
The Russian delegation included Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Defense Minister Andrey Belousov, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov, Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov, and presidential economic envoy Kirill Dmitriev, who has been a key figure in the Ukraine settlement process.
The US team included Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe.