Ukraine will not cede land, says Zelenskiy, as Trump, Putin plan 15 Aug meeting in Alaska

Highlights:

• Trump and Putin will meet 15 August, Trump says
• Trump says Ukraine war ceasefire deal is close
• Putin claims four Ukrainian regions for Russia
• Trump says peace deal would involve some swap of territory

US President Donald Trump will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin on 15 August in Alaska to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine, Trump said yesterday (8 August).

Trump made the highly anticipated announcement on social media after he said that the parties, including Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, were close to a ceasefire deal that could resolve the three-and-a-half-year conflict, one that could require Ukraine to surrender significant territory.

Addressing reporters at the White House earlier yesterday, Trump suggested an agreement would involve some exchange of land.

"There'll be some swapping of territories to the betterment of both," the Republican president said.

However, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said today (9 August) that Ukraine could not violate its constitution on the territorial issues, adding that "Ukrainians will not gift their land to the occupiers."

The Kremlin confirmed the summit in an online statement.

The two leaders will "focus on discussing options for achieving a long-term peaceful resolution to the Ukrainian crisis," Putin aide Yuri Ushakov said.

"This will evidently be a challenging process, but we will engage in it actively and energetically," Ushakov said.

In a video address to the nation posted on his Telegram channel on Saturday, Zelenskiy said that any decisions without Ukraine would be decisions against peace.

"They will not achieve anything. These are stillborn decisions. They are unworkable decisions. And we all need real and genuine peace," Zelenskiy said.

Putin claims four Ukrainian regions – Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson – as well as the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, which he annexed in 2014. His forces do not fully control all the territory in the four regions.

Earlier, Bloomberg News reported that USand Russian officials were working towards an agreement that would lock in Moscow's occupation of territory seized during its military invasion.

A White House official said the Bloomberg story was speculation. A Kremlin spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

Reuters was unable to confirm aspects of the Bloomberg report.

Ukraine has previously signaled a willingness to be flexible in the search for an end to a war that has ravaged its towns and cities and killed large numbers of its soldiers and citizens.

But accepting the loss of around a fifth of Ukraine's territory would be painful and politically challenging for Zelenskiy and his government.

Tyson Barker, the USState Department's former deputy special representative for Ukraine's economic recovery, said the peace proposal as outlined in the Bloomberg report would be immediately rejected by the Ukrainians.

"The best the Ukrainians can do is remain firm in their objections and their conditions for a negotiated settlement, while demonstrating their gratitude for American support," said Barker, a senior fellow with the Atlantic Council.

Under the putative deal, according to Bloomberg, Russia would halt its offensive in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions along current battle lines.

TRUMP AND PUTIN

The last time Alaska hosted a high-stakes diplomatic gathering was in March 2021, when senior officials from the administration of Democratic former President Joe Biden met with top Chinese officials in Anchorage.

The get-together involving Biden's top diplomat Antony Blinken and his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi quickly turned into a stunning public clash in front of the cameras, with both sides leveling sharp rebukes of the others' policies that reflected the high tension in bilateral ties.

Since his return to the White House in January, Trump has moved to mend relations with Russia and sought to end the war. In his public comments he has veered between admiration and sharp criticism of Putin.

In a sign of his growing frustration with Putin's refusal to halt Russia's military offensive, Trump had threatened to impose new sanctions and tariffs from Friday against Moscow and countries that buy its exports unless the Russian leader agreed to end the conflict, the deadliest in Europe since World War Two.

It was unclear by Friday evening whether those sanctions would take effect or be delayed or canceled.

The administration took a step toward punishing Moscow's oil customers on Wednesday, imposing an additional 25% tariff on goods from India over its imports of Russian oil, marking the first financial penalty aimed at Russia in Trump's second term.

Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff held three hours of talks with Putin in Moscow on Wednesday that both sides described as constructive.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk of Poland, a close ally of Ukraine, said earlier on Friday that a pause in the conflict could be close. He was speaking after talks with Zelenskiy.

"There are certain signals, and we also have an intuition, that perhaps a freeze in the conflict – I don't want to say the end, but a freeze in the conflict – is closer than it is further away," Tusk told a news conference. "There are hopes for this."

Tusk also said Zelenskiy was "very cautious but optimistic" and that Ukraine was keen that Poland and other European countries play a role in planning for a ceasefire and an eventual peace settlement.