The White House is considering inviting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to Alaska, where the US President Donald Trump is scheduled to meet with Putin on August 15.
NBC News reports this, citing a senior American official and three people briefed on internal discussions.
“It’s being discussed,” said one person briefed on the talks.
The publicationʼs sources say it is not yet clear whether Zelensky will be invited, but it is "absolutely" possible. The official stressed that "everyone is very hopeful that this will happen".
"The President remains open to a trilateral summit with both leaders. The White House is currently focused on planning the bilateral meeting that President Putin requested," a senior White House official said when asked if Zelensky had been officially invited.
If Zelensky had gone to Alaska, it’s unclear whether he and Putin would ever have been in the same room, said one of the people familiar with the talks. The Ukrainian government did not respond to NBC News’ request for comment.
What preceded
The Wall Street Journal reported that on August 6, Putin presented the Donald Trump administration with a sweeping proposal for a ceasefire in Ukraine in exchange for significant territorial concessions. In the first phase, Ukraine would withdraw its troops from the Donetsk region and freeze the front line. In the second phase, Putin and Trump would agree on a final peace plan, which would later be discussed with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
European officials have sought to clarify what Putinʼs proposal means for the occupied territories of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions. They have not received a clear answer, but a WSJ source says that Putin called for a halt to the war on the current lines in both regions.
European partners and Ukraine responded to Putinʼs ceasefire plan with a counter-proposal on August 9. It states that before any other steps, the parties must achieve a ceasefire.
And the exchange of territories can only be carried out on a reciprocal basis, meaning that if Ukraine withdraws troops from some regions, Russia must withdraw troops from others. Ukraineʼs territorial concessions must be protected by security guarantees, including potential NATO membership.
"Ukrainians will not give away their land" — this is how President Zelensky reacted to the announcement of the meeting between Trump and Putin. He emphasized that the Ukrainian Constitution clearly answers about territories.
"He [Putin] wants to exchange a pause in the war, in the killings for the legalization of the occupation of our land — he wants to get territorial spoils for the second time. He was allowed to take Crimea, and this led to the occupation of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. He did not receive preventive punishment when he gathered a contingent on our borders. This led to a full-scale war and the occupation of more parts of Ukraine. Now Putin wants to be forgiven for seizing the south of our Kherson region, Zaporizhzhia, the entire territory of Luhansk, Donetsk regions, Crimea. We will not give Russia this second attempt to divide Ukraine. Knowing Russia, where there is a second, there is a third," Zelensky emphasized.
- Next week, on August 15, Putin and Trump will meet in Alaska. The main topic of the meeting is the war in Ukraine.
- Trump previously claimed that there was a "good chance" of a meeting between Putin and Zelensky. However, Putin himself, commenting on the possibility of meeting with Zelensky, stated that there were currently no suitable conditions for this.
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