There was no deal when U.S. President Donald Trump met his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin on Friday.
That was not unexpected. The summit, which was initially arranged to discuss a ceasefire to Moscow’s war in Ukraine, was on Tuesday reframed by White House Spokesperson Karoline Leavitt as a “listening exercise” that allowed Trump to get a “better understanding of how we can hopefully bring this war to an end.”
Prior to the summit, analysts were already casting doubt on the talks advancing any real ceasefire in Ukraine.
“Let’s be clear, Putin does not take Trump seriously,” Tina Fordham, founder of Fordham Global Foresight, told CNBC.
And the fact that the summit was scheduled — and Putin invited to Alaska, the first time he stepped on U.S. soil in about a decade — was already a “big win” for the Kremlin leader, according to a comment by Richard Portes, head of the economics faculty at the London Business School, before the meeting took place.
While no agreement was reached, Trump on Friday described the meeting as “very productive” — and announced the next day that he would be pursuing a “peace agreement” rather than a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.
But peace means very different things to the Ukraine, Russia and America. To one, it could be the complete halt of armed warfare and the retreat of foreign troops from its soil. To another, it might seem like acquiring annexed territory. And for some, it might look like a shiny golden coin engraved with the profile of Alfred Nobel, regardless of the prerequisites.
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An operator working at a data center.
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