President Donald Trump announced he will meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Aug. 15. This comes as Putin reportedly offered to end the war in exchange for the Donbas region in Eastern Ukraine.
Kurt Volker, the former U.S. ambassador to NATO and the former special representative for Ukraine negotiations, told Newsmax on Friday that Putin "has not suggested any concessions at all."
"He still wants his absolute maximalist demands of taking over Ukrainian territory, recognizing that as Russian territory, demilitarization of Ukraine, no NATO membership, no EU membership and so forth. So, I applaud President Trump for going the extra mile to try to see whether there's a possibility of reaching any kind of agreement with Vladimir Putin that would end the war. But so far, Putin has offered nothing," Volker said during an appearance on "The Record With Greta Van Susteren."
Volker noted that having the meeting in Alaska plays into Putin's dreams of expanding Russia's former territories. "Alaska also used to be part of the Russian Empire. So I wonder if Putin is going there to measure the curtains. But even if Putin does not put Alaska on his target list, it is interesting that he's going to be meeting there and President Trump would choose Alaska as a place to meet, because it is really Putin's ambitions to rebuild the Russian empire that are at the heart of this conflict," he added.
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James Morley III ✉
James Morley III is a writer with more than two decades of experience in entertainment, travel, technology, and science and nature.
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