British Prime Minister Keir Starmer welcomed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to London on Thursday, a day before a critical U.S.-Russia summit in Alaska.
“Yesterday, together with all partners, today in a bilateral format, we discussed expectations from the meeting in Alaska and possible prospects,” Zelenskyy said in a social media post after the meeting. “We also discussed in detail security guarantees that can make peace truly sustainable if the United States still manages to pressure Russia to stop the killings and engage in real meaningful diplomacy. It is important that we can all work together within a coalition of those willing to achieve effective formats for security work.”
Zelenskyy’s trip to the British capital came a day after he took part in virtual meetings from Berlin with President Donald Trump and the leaders of several European countries. Those leaders said Trump had assured them he would make it a priority to try to achieve a ceasefire in Ukraine during his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday in Anchorage.
Putin was holding a meeting in Russia on Thursday with members of Russia’s leadership to prepare for the Alaska meeting. As part of that preparatory meeting, he said he wanted to discuss the negotiation process with Ukraine and how it was going.
Putin also said he planned “to talk about the stage we are at with the current American administration, which, as everyone knows, is making, in my opinion, quite energetic and sincere efforts to stop the fighting, stop the crisis and reach agreements that are of interest to all parties involved in this conflict.”
Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said Thursday that the Friday meeting between Mr. Trump and Putin in Alaska is expected to begin at around 11:30 a.m. local time on Friday. The main topic will be the war in Ukraine, but there will also be discussions about economic cooperation between Washington and Moscow.
He said the meeting will take place at Elmendorf-Richardson Air Force Base, and that there will first be a one-on-one meeting between the two leaders before their delegations join.
Mr. Trump and Putin will say a few words at the start of the meeting, Ushakov said, and they will hold a joint press conference afterwards.
Ushakov said each delegation will have five members. For Russia, those will be Ushakov, as well as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund Kirill Dmitriev, and Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov.
Alaska summit “hugely important”
Both Zelenskyy and the Europeans have worried the bilateral U.S.-Russia summit would leave them and their interests sidelined, and that any conclusions reached could favor Moscow and leave Ukraine and Europe’s future security in jeopardy.
Yet some of those leaders, like German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron, praised Wednesday’s video conference with Trump as constructive.
Speaking after the meetings to reporters, Trump warned of “very severe consequences” for Russia if Putin does not agree to stop the war against Ukraine after Friday’s meeting.
Starmer on Wednesday said the Alaska summit would be “hugely important,” and could be a “viable” path to a ceasefire in Ukraine. But he also alluded to European concerns that Trump may strike a deal that forces Ukraine to cede territory to Russia, and warned that Western allies must be prepared to step up pressure on Russia if necessary.
BEN STANSALL
During a call Wednesday among leaders of countries involved in the “coalition of the willing” – those who are prepared to help police any future peace agreement between Moscow and Kyiv – Starmer stressed that any deal reached on bringing the fighting to an end must protect the “territorial integrity” of Ukraine.
“International borders cannot be, and must not be changed by force,” he said. “Any talk about borders, diplomacy, ceasefire has to sit alongside a robust and credible security guarantee to ensure that any peace, if there is peace, is lasting peace and Ukraine can defend its territorial integrity as part of any deal.”
Kyiv has long insisted that safeguards against future Russian attacks provided by its Western allies would be a precondition for achieving a durable end to the fighting in Ukraine. Yet many Western governments have been hesitant to commit to engaging their military personnel.
Countries in the “coalition of the willing,” which include France and the U.K., have been trying for months to secure U.S. security backing should it be required. Following Wednesday’s virtual meetings, Macron said Trump told the assembled leaders that while the NATO military alliance must not be part of future security guarantees, the U.S. leader agreed that “the United States and all the parties involved should take part.”
“It’s a very important clarification that we have received,” Macron said.
European Council President Antonio Costa also welcomed “the readiness of the United States to share with Europe the efforts to reinforce security conditions once we obtain a durable and just peace for Ukraine.”
“I don’t see any changes coming”
With another high-level meeting on their country’s future on the horizon, some Ukrainians expressed skepticism that any breakthroughs would be achieved during Friday’s U.S.-Russia summit.
Oleksandra Kozlova, 39, a department head at a digital agency in Kyiv, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that she believes Ukrainians “have already lost hope” that meaningful progress can be made on ending the 3 1/2-year-old war.
“I don’t think this round will be decisive,” she said. “There have already been enough meetings and negotiations promising us, ordinary people, that something will be resolved, that things will get better, that the war will end. Unfortunately, this has not happened, so personally I don’t see any changes coming.”
Anton Vyshniak, a car salesman in Kyiv, said Ukraine’s priority now should be saving the lives of its military servicepeople, even at the expense of making territorial concessions.
“At the moment, the most important thing is to preserve the lives of male and female military personnel. After all, there are not many human resources left,” he said. “Borders are borders, but human lives are priceless. Therefore, some principles can be disregarded here.”
Russian strikes in Ukraine’s Sumy region overnight Wednesday resulted in numerous injuries, Ukrainian regional officials said. A missile strike on a village in the Seredyna-Budska community injured a 7-year-old girl and a 27-year-old man, according to regional governor Oleh Hryhorov. The girl was hospitalized in stable condition.
In the southern Kherson region, Russian artillery fire struck the village of Molodizhne on Thursday morning, injuring a 16-year-old boy, regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin said. The teenager suffered an explosive injury, shrapnel wounds to his arms and legs and an acute stress reaction. He was hospitalized in moderate condition, Prokudin said.
In Russia, an oil refinery in the Volgograd region caught fire after a Ukrainian drone attack overnight, according to local governor Andrei Bocharov. The refinery, one of the biggest producers of petroleum products in southern Russia, has been a frequent target of drone attacks, according to Russian independent news site Meduza.
Overall, Russia’s Defense Ministry reported destroying 44 Ukrainian drones over Russian regions and the annexed Crimea overnight.
contributed to this report.