A much-anticipated summit between US President Donald Trump and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin has broken up without a deal on a cease-fire in Ukraine and with neither man taking questions from journalists at a news conference.
In a terse, three-minute statement to the press after his nearly three-hour meeting with Putin, Trump said his team made "great progress" but that "we haven't quite got there" and that no deal was struck to end the Kremlin's war against Ukraine.
Speaking at the US Joint Base Elmendorf near Anchorage, Alaska, where the meeting was held, both Putin and Trump provided almost no detail about what exactly had been agreed or what the sticking points were.
Trump, who was criticized in some quarters for meeting Putin without involving Ukraine in the talks, said he would call Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, NATO, and European allies to brief them on the results.
"There's no deal until there's a deal," Trump cautioned.
"I'm going to start making a few phone calls and tell them what happened, but we had an extremely productive meeting, and many points were agreed to," he said.
"There are just a very few [issues] that are left. Some are not that significant. One is probably the most significant, but we have a very good chance of getting there."
Trump has repeatedly threatened to impose sanctions on Russia and tariffs on its trading partners if Moscow did not halt its aggression. However, he has held off on such moves to the frustration of Kyiv and Brussels, expressing concerns that economic penalties on Moscow would stall the diplomacy he has invested so much time into. Trump made no mention of sanctions in his statement.
In comments to Fox News' Sean Hannity following the summit, Trump said again that no deal had been struck but claimed that "a lot of points were negotiated" and that "one or two pretty significant items" were agreed upon, but he did not cite specifics.
Trump added that "now, it's really up to President Zelenskyy to get it done. And I would also say the European nations -- they have to get involved a little bit. But it's up to President Zelenskyy."
Putin spoke of an "understanding" with Trump on the war, without being specific, and said he hoped that Ukraine and its European allies would not '"torpedo" any plans.
He said Russia will continue to insist on the elimination of what it calls the "root causes" of the conflict -- which is Kremlin code for putting an end to Ukraine's hopes of NATO membership and steps to effectively disarm the Ukrainian military -- items Kyiv has long rejected.
But he also added that "the security of Ukraine should be assured as well." Putin has occasionally questioned Ukraine's very right to exist.
Given the time difference, there was no immediate comment from officials in Kyiv or the European Union -- who watched nervously from afar, wary of any developments that could endanger Ukraine's security or sovereignty.
Luke Coffey, a senior analyst at the Hudson Institute, told RFE/RL that Putin appeared to be the big winner of the summit and "has basically all but guaranteed" that Russia faces no further sanction or tariffs.
"He has bought more time to continue to wage his war and he now has the international legitimacy -- at least from the president of the United States -- that he's craved. And he has done all this without giving anything."
Mikhail Alexseev, a professor at San Diego State University, said the lack of progress indicates that Putin had not softened his maximalist demands.
"It basically tells me that Russia just repeated its common positions. It did not change its stance," he told RFE/RL.
“Putin certainly got what he wanted out of this meeting. He got the welcome, the red carpet. He got the handshakes. And in essence, it normalizes his position as the world leader. It sidelines the whole war [and] deflects attention from Russia's aggression against Ukraine,” Alexseev said.
After Putin arrived at the US base aboard his presidential jet shortly before the summit, Trump greeted him on the tarmac, which was lined with a red carpet.
In a surprising move, Putin then joined Trump in the ultra-secure US presidential limousine -- known as "The Beast" -- casually chatting as they headed toward the meeting site, a rare honor for a leader of an adversarial nation.
Though Trump and Putin have spoken by phone at least five times since January, the August 15 meeting was their first face-to-face meeting of Trump's second term.
Trump has suggested that any resolution to the war could include "swapping of territories." That would conflict with Kyiv's long-standing position that it must regain all the territory Russia currently occupies.
Trump did not address the potential land swaps during his remarks to journalists.
