A summit meeting for nothing
Two close friends of retirement age, dressed in suits and red ties, organized an expensive meeting, watched by the whole world and sending a message of peace that sounds false.
Yesterday, the world’s attention was focused on the Elmendorf-Richardson military base in Anchorage, where there was actually no discussion about ending the war in Ukraine. For three hours, the three participants from both sides repeated the arguments we have heard before, but the difference this time was that Russian President Vladimir Putin traveled hundreds of kilometers to visit Alaska.
President Donald Trump left his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin without an agreement and without saying much. Trump rarely misses an opportunity to take advantage of the world stage. But when he stood next to Putin at the end of their three-hour meeting, Trump did not give many details about what the two had discussed. Surprisingly for a president who loves press conferences, he did not answer questions from reporters gathered at a military base in Alaska.
In his brief comments, Trump acknowledged that he and Putin had not reached an agreement to end the war in Ukraine or even to halt the fighting. “There is no agreement until there is an agreement,” the president said. He described their three-hour meeting — rather vaguely — as “very productive.” Of the unresolved issues between the two countries, he acknowledged that “one of them is probably significant,” but did not say what it was.
