U.S. President Trump meets with Russian President Putin in Alaska

U.S. President Donald Trump holds a press conference with Russian President Vladimir Putin following their meeting to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine, at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, U.S., August 15, 2025. REUTERS/Jeenah Moon

Donald Trump is meeting Volodymyr Zelenskiy and European leaders. The risk is the US president does Moscow’s bidding by pushing territorial concessions on his Ukrainian counterpart. If so, Europe needs a firmer plan to help Kyiv face down Russia than is currently the case.

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Editing by George Hay; Production by Oliver Taslic

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Pierre Briancon is a Breakingviews columnist, writing on European business and economics. He was previously a writer or editor at Barron’s, Politico, and Breakingviews for a first stint as Paris correspondent and European editor. For the first part of his career he was a foreign correspondent and editor at Libération, the French newspaper. He was also an economics columnist for Le Monde and for French public radio.