Putin Aide Says Trump Breached Ukraine ‘Agreement’

Vladimir Putin’s most senior diplomat has accused Donald Trump of breaching Russia and America’s “Anchorage agreement” over Ukraine.

The US president rolled out the red carpet for his counterpart last August by welcoming him to a one-on-one summit in the Alaskan city.

According to Trump, the meeting was “extremely productive”, even though it did not appear to produce any concrete results.

The US president said at the time they had a “very good chance” of a ceasefire at some point and that there were “many, many points that we agreed on” without offering any further details.

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has suggested the two leaders struck an “Anchorage agreement” where both countries decided Ukraine would surrender the whole of the Donbas region without resistance.

This has been a long-standing demand from the Kremlin, though Ukraine has refused to support it only saying a demilitarised zone could be considered instead.

But, speaking to Russian TV BRICS this week, Lavrov claimed the White House was refusing to implement their deal and was prioritising a policy of “economy domination” instead.

Lavrov said: “They tell us that the Ukrainian issue needs to be resolved. In Anchorage, we accepted the proposal of the US. They made an offer, we agreed and the problems should have been resolved.

“It seems that they proposed it and we were ready – and now they are not.”

The US has not ever confirmed the existence of such an agreement.

Until now the Kremlin has widely avoided criticising the Trump administration, which has been much softer on Russia than any other powers in the West.

But Lavrov went so far as to accuse the States of pursuing an anti-Russia policy this week, referring to the new sanctions the West has slapped on the country.

In a separate interview with state-owned NTV, the top Russian diplomat also poured cold water on the idea that the ongoing trilateral talks with Russia, Ukraine and the US in the UAE were going well.

While Trump insisted peace is “closer than ever before”, Lavrov cautioned against being too optimistic.

He said there was “some kind of enthusiastic perception of what is happening” which should not be embraced, adding: “Negotiations are continuing… there is still a long way to go”.

“All of this would be very good if we want to achieve peace, but we are not there yet,” the diplomat said.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy is expected to share plans for a presidential election and a referendum on a potential peace deal, later this month, exactly four years after Putin launched his invasion.

The Trump administration has been echoing baseless Kremlin claims that Zelenskyy is a dictator, having stayed in his post past his term end – even though wartime laws usually prevent elections.

The Ukrainian president also claimed that the US wants to end the war before the start of summer, though the US ambassador to Nato Matthew Whitaker rejected that claim.

“That June deadline was mentioned by President Zelenskyy. I don’t think that is anything that the United States has put out there. We’d like it sooner rather than later,” he said.

The US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confirmed at the start of the month that the US will choose whether to slap additional sanctions on Russia based on the progress in the peace talks.