WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he was planning a second meeting with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin soon after Friday’s Alaska summit — this time with Ukraine leader Volodymyr Zelensky included.
Trump is due to sit down with Putin in Anchorage on Friday, the first meeting between the Russian leader and a sitting US president since 2021.
“If the first one goes okay, we’ll have a quick second one,” Trump told reporters.
“I would like to do it almost immediately, and we’ll have a quick second meeting between President Putin and President Zelensky and myself, if they’d like to have me there.”
The high-stakes talks come with Trump seeking to broker an end to the nearly three-and-a-half year war in Ukraine, and Zelensky and his European allies have urged the Republican to push for a ceasefire.
Trump said Russia would face “very severe consequences” if Putin did not agree to end the war after Friday’s meeting, without elaborating.
The US leader promised dozens of times during his 2024 election campaign to end the war on his first day in office but has made scant progress towards brokering a peace deal.
He threatened “secondary sanctions” on Russia’s trading partners over the Ukraine war but his deadline for action came and went last week with no action announced.
Trump told reporters he’d had a “very good call” with European leaders including Zelensky as he took questions from reporters at an arts event at Washington’s Kennedy Center.
“I would rate it at 10. You know — very, very friendly,” he said.
Chance for Ukraine ceasefire
Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said there was now a “viable” chance for a Ukraine ceasefire.
Starmer said Ukraine’s military backers, the Coalition of the Willing, had drawn up workable military plans in case of a ceasefire but were also ready to add pressure on Russia through sanctions.
“For three and a bit years this conflict has been going, we haven’t got anywhere near… a viable way of bringing it to a ceasefire,” Starmer told a meeting of European leaders.
“Now we do have that chance, because of the work that the (US) president has put in,” he told the video conference he led alongside German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron.
The call was joined by Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky from Germany, and US Vice President JD Vance, who is currently visiting the UK.
While Starmer said Friday’s Alaska meeting between Trump and Putin was “hugely important”, he reiterated that there “should be no negotiations about Ukraine without Ukraine”.
“This is a critical moment, we have to combine active diplomacy on the one hand with military support to Ukraine and pressure on Russia,” he said.
The coalition has drawn up military plans “which are now ready in a form that can be used if we get to that ceasefire”, Starmer added.
He said Britain and other European allies also “stand ready to increase pressure on Russia” through sanctions and “wider measures” if necessary.
He added that Trump had agreed to “debrief immediately” after his meeting with Putin.
Europeans urge Ukraine ceasefire
Zelensky and his European allies urged Trump on Wednesday to support Kyiv and push for a ceasefire when he meets Putin.
Zelensky flew to Berlin and joined Chancellor Merz on an online call with other European leaders, and the NATO and EU chiefs, in which they talked to Trump and urged a united stance against Russia.
French President Emmanuel Macron said afterwards that “the American will is to obtain a ceasefire”.
Speaking in Berlin, Zelensky said that “we hope that the central topic at the meeting will be a ceasefire. An immediate ceasefire”.
“Sanctions must be in place and must be strengthened if Russia does not agree to a ceasefire.”
But he also voiced doubt about Moscow’s intentions and said: “I have told my colleagues, the US president, and our European friends, that Putin definitely does not want peace.”
Merz, standing beside Zelensky, also said that “a ceasefire must come first” before any peace talks and that Ukraine must “at the table” at any follow-up meeting after Alaska.
Any negotiations must include robust security guarantees for Kyiv and “be part of a joint transatlantic strategy”, he said.
‘Feel-out meeting’
Trump on Monday played down the possibility of a breakthrough in Alaska but said he expected “constructive conversations” with Putin.
“This is really a feel-out meeting a little bit,” Trump said. But he added that eventually “there’ll be some swapping, there’ll be some changes in land”.
Merz said “Ukraine is ready to negotiate on territorial issues” but also stressed that “legal recognition of Russian occupations is not up for debate”.
Macron said that “territorial questions concerning Ukraine can be, and will be, negotiated only by the Ukrainian president”.
