What do Trump and Putin hope to get out of Alaska meetingpublished at 13:12 British Summer Time
13:12 BST
Madeline Halpert and Christal Hayes
Image source, epaImage caption,
Dolls on sale in a souvenir market in Moscow on 11 August
While both Russia and Ukraine have long said that they want the war to end, both countries want things that the other harshly opposes.
President Trump said on Monday he was “going to try to get some of that [Russian-occupied] territory back for Ukraine”. But he also warned that there might have to be “some swapping, changes in land”.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has pushed back against any idea of “swapping” territories.
He is adamant that Ukraine will not accept Russian control of regions that Moscow has seized, including Crimea.
“We will not reward Russia for what it has perpetrated,” the Ukrainian president said.
Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin has not budged from his territorial demands, Ukraine’s neutrality and the future size of its army.
Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, in part, over Putin’s belief the Western defensive alliance, Nato, was using the neighbouring country to gain a foothold to bring its troops closer to Russia’s borders.