Shut out of discussions, Ukraine’s exclusion recalls 2020 Afghanistan talkspublished at 22:32 British Summer Time
22:32 BST
Lyse Doucet
Chief international correspondent
A red line was crossed on a red carpet as President Trump warmly welcomed the man shunned by Western leaders since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
And there’s a familiar ring to this summit slogan of “pursuing peace”.
In President Trump’s first term, his high stakes diplomacy involved a US deal with the Taliban in Feb 2020; it was called “Bringing Peace to Afghanistan”.
Then, it was the exclusion of the Afghan government from those talks which was controversial.
President Trump even talked about inviting Taliban leaders, under US sanctions linked to terrorism, to Camp David.
Today, it’s the fact that Ukraine is not at the table to discuss the future of Ukraine.
It won’t be lost on some observers, most of all Afghans, that the US president is sitting down with President Putin on the day which marks the fourth anniversary of the Taliban’s return to power.
The Taliban knew that once they made a deal with the US, their victory was in sight; President Putin may be thinking the same.