The meeting lasted nearly three hours in Alaska and opened the possibility of new negotiations on the conflict in Ukraine.

US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, met this Friday in Anchorage, Alaska, seeking to move toward a peace treaty between Russia and Ukraine. The summit lasted nearly three hours and took place at the Elmendorf-Richardson military base, a historic site the US purchased from Russia in 1867 for $7.2 million, equivalent to between $150 and $200 million today.

Hours before the meeting, Trump told reporters that his goal was to get"Putin back to the negotiating table," signaling his intention to push for a deal.

This is the first face-to-face meeting between the two leaders since Trump's second inauguration. In addition to the presidents, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff also participated.

The two leaders arrived with different interests. According to analyst Lucien Kim, a specialist in Ukraine at Crisis Group,"For Trump, it will be a peace summit, but Putin will focus more on making peace with the US. He feels he's winning the war and risks very little."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky did not attend the summit, nor did European and NATO leaders, who remain indirectly involved in the conflict. Brussels warns that Trump could try to redraw the map of Ukraine without Kyiv's approval.

Expectations and pressures of the summit

Trump has warned Putin of"very serious consequences" if he doesn't sit down to negotiate an end to the war. However, the Kremlin leader is demanding that Ukraine recognize the annexation of Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia, and Kherson, and that it commit to not joining NATO—demands Zelensky rejects.

The US president is seeking to get Ukraine to accept at least the loss of part of its territory occupied by Russia. At a press conference at the White House, he stated:

"We're going to shift the battle lines. Russia has occupied a large part of Ukraine. They've occupied some very important territories. We're going to try to reclaim some of that territory for Ukraine."

Crisis Group analyst Oleg Ignatov noted: “Russia and the US have very different ideas about how the war in Ukraine should end. I don’t think Trump’s vision of a land swap will work for Putin. Putin believes he’s winning the war and is in a strong position, and he’s certainly not considering painful compromises.”

Ignatov added that"unless a miracle occurs, Putin could accept some tactical compromises to maintain control over his conflict with the West without alienating Trump. He may agree to meet with Zelensky under certain conditions and some limited or temporary ceasefires, though not necessarily."

Trump, for his part, insists on including Zelensky in another tripartite summit to be held immediately after the Alaska meeting, although Putin shows no willingness to budge on his demands and appears confident in his position within the conflict.

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