Trump says Putin meeting set for next week in Alaska amid push for ceasefire in Ukraine

A long -awaited meeting between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin is scheduled for next week in Alaska, Trump announced on social media on Friday.

“The long-awaited meeting between myself, as president of the United States of America, and President Vladimir Putin, of Russia, will take place on Friday August 15, 2025, in the great state of Alaska,” Trump wrote on Trum Social.

More details and the logistics of the meeting are not yet clear and remain very fluid, especially if the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy will be involved.

The Russian Embassy in Washington, DC, did not immediately respond to a request for comments on Friday.

A White House official said earlier on Friday that the Russians had provided a list of potential ceasefire requests for the war in Ukraine, and the United States tried to obtain the membership of European Ukrainians and allies.

Zelenskyy and Ukrainian officials have long declared that they would not concede any territory that Russia has illegally annexed.

On Friday, in a statement, the press secretary of the White House, Karoline Leavitt, told NBC News: “President Trump was clear since he inherited this war of Joe Biden six months ago: he wants this to end at the negotiating table. In the direction of the president, the Special Witkoff shipment met again with President Putin to discuss potential pathways to peace, and the president and his national security team are discussed these ways with the two states with the two Urikrains and the Europeans. Diplomatic discussions with Russia, Ukraine and our European allies, the White House will not comment on the alleged details in the media. »»

Friday, European National Security and White House advisers were to join a call to ensure that everyone has a common understanding of what is in discussion with Russia, according to a person familiar with the call.

Secretary of State Rubio Marco was to be on the call, as well as the special envoys of the White House Steve Witkoff and Keith Kellogg.

Trump told journalists from the oval office on Thursday that a meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy was not a prerequisite for a meeting between the United States and Russian leaders.

The White House had already launched the possibility of a trilateral meeting between Trump, Putin and Zelenskyy, but the Kremlin rejected this idea on Thursday.

Later Thursday, Putin told the Kremlin journalists that the idea of a meeting of Trump -Putin had been launched, saying: “The interest was shown on both sides. Who said what is first – it is more important.”

Putin also talked about the possibility of meeting Zelenskyy himself directly, telling journalists that his “conditions” for such a meeting have not yet been met.

“I have already said on several occasions that, in general, I have nothing against it. It is possible. But for this to happen, certain conditions must be created. Unfortunately, such conditions are still far,” said Putin.

On Friday, Zelenskyy wrote on the details of his conversation with the South African president Cyril Ramaphosa in an article on X, blaming Russia for the continuation of the war.

“Cyril also shared the details of his conversation with the Russian part. The position of Ukraine is absolutely clear: the path to peace must start with a cease-fire,” wrote Zelenskyy.

He added: “We are ready for this, as well as for meetings at the highest level in various formats. From the first seconds of the war, we wanted it to end, because it was not Ukraine that began this war. And it is Russia which is the only reason for its extension and the absence of peace.”

Later Friday, at the White House, Trump suggested that there had been talks on Russia and that Ukraine “exchanging” a territory as part of a cease-fire contract.

“We are actually looking to recover and exchange. It is complicated. It is actually nothing easy. It is very complicated,” said the president at an event with leaders of Azerbaijan and Armenia. “But we are going to recover it. We are going to change. There will be an exchange of territories towards the improvement of the two and … we will talk about it later or tomorrow, or other.”

Zelenskyy has long argued that he did not entertain discussions on Russia keeping territorial control of Crimea.

The summit next week between Trump and Putin will be the first meeting between the two leaders in the second Trump administration.

Trump and Zelenskyy have met several times in the past seven months, especially during a rally of oval offices in February which ended with a cries between Trump, Zelenskyy and Vice-President JD Vance.

The two also met on the sidelines of Pope Francis funeral in April.

Throughout last year’s presidential campaign, Trump often told voters that a priorities ended the war in Ukraine. In recent months, he has disturbed between blaming Putin and Zelenskyy for the continuation of the war.

During his oval office remarks Thursday, Trump said that he was “very disappointed” and that he expected him to decide on Friday of a potential ceasefire in the war.

“It will do him.