WASHINGTON, D.C. – US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet in Alaska next Friday, August 15, in a high-stakes attempt to discuss the future of the war in Ukraine.
Trump announced the meeting on social media, and the Kremlin later confirmed the plans, calling the location “quite logical” due to Alaska’s geographic proximity to Russia.
The announcement comes just hours after Trump floated the idea that Ukraine might have to cede territory to end the war, which began with Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.
“You’re looking at territory that’s been fought over for three and a half years. A lot of Russians have died. A lot of Ukrainians have died,” Trump said at the White House on Friday. “There will be some swapping of territories, to the betterment of both.”
Possible Land-Swap Plan
Details of the proposal remain unclear, but CBS News reports the White House is seeking to rally European support for an agreement that would see Russia keep the Donbas region and Crimea, while relinquishing partial control of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions.
The Wall Street Journal also reported that Putin had recently presented a similar framework to Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff in Moscow.
Ukraine and its allies have consistently rejected any precondition involving territorial concessions.
President Volodymyr Zelensky has said Ukraine will not trade land for peace, insisting that Russian troops must withdraw from all occupied territories.
Diplomatic Gamble
A senior White House official told CBS that meeting logistics remain fluid, and Zelensky could be brought into the talks. However, the gulf between Kyiv and Moscow’s demands remains vast.
Russia wants Ukraine to declare neutrality, abandon NATO membership plans, reduce its military, and see Western sanctions lifted — demands Kyiv views as capitulation.
Trump, however, expressed optimism: “We have a shot at a trilateral peace agreement. European leaders want peace, President Putin wants peace, and President Zelensky wants peace.”
The planned Alaska meeting will be the first in-person talks between a US and Russian president since Joe Biden met Putin in Geneva in 2021.
