The Russia-Ukraine war faces significant obstacles to ending, primarily due to the conflicting territorial and political demands of both sides. Ukraine insists on reclaiming all its lost territories, including Crimea, and will not renounce its intention of becoming a NATO member. Russia, on the other hand, seeks sweeping political changes in Kyiv and aims to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO. These fundamental disagreements create a deadlock that makes a negotiated settlement extremely difficult. Neither side is willing to end the war on terms that are acceptable to the other side.

Against this background, President Donald Trump said he’ll be meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday, 15th August, in Alaska, to work out a potential peace deal to end the war in Ukraine that could include “some swapping of territories." Trump’s announcement came on the day which he had set as the deadline for Putin to make peace or face severe economic punishment.

Trump posted on Truth Social: “The highly anticipated meeting between myself, as President of the United States of America, and President Vladimir Putin, of Russia, will take place next Friday, August 15, 2025, in the Great State of Alaska. Further details to follow".

India has said that it “welcomes the understanding reached between the United States and the Russian Federation for a meeting in Alaska on 15th August 2025", and that “this meeting holds the promise of bringing to an end the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and opening up the prospects for peace."

Being India’s Independence Day, 15th August is a very auspicious day for all Indians, and one cannot but hope that it proves auspicious for the Ukrainians and Russians also.

China’s President Xi Jinping has also said he is pleased to see Moscow maintain contact with the United States to advance a political resolution of the Ukraine crisis.

However, while President Trump is pushing for a potential ceasefire agreement that could end Russia’s three-year war against Ukraine, the huge divergence between the Russian and Ukrainian positions will make it extremely difficult to bring the conflict to an end.

Trump and Putin had last met in 2019 on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Osaka and have not met since then. Moreover, Putin has not visited the US since 2015 when he attended the UN General Assembly meeting. Interestingly, in his address to the General Assembly, Putin had stressed “the vital importance of respecting State sovereignty" and had said that “many of the crises facing the world have been exacerbated by countries acting against sovereign States outside the UN Charter!" Ironically, Putin is now widely accused of undermining Ukraine’s sovereignty, and this has been a central accusation throughout the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian conflict which escalated into a full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Trump said he would hold a meeting with Putin regardless of whether the Russian leader agrees to meet his Ukrainian counterpart Zelensky. A White House press official had earlier said that a meeting between Putin and Zelensky was a precondition to a meeting between Putin and Trump, but Putin had rejected the idea of meeting Zelensky.

In May 2025, Putin had similarly declined to meet with Zelenskyy during talks in Turkey and instead........

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