ANCHORAGE /Alaska /, August 16. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed that the conflict in Ukraine would have never started had Donald Trump been the president of the United States in 2022.
"I'd like to remind you that in 2022 during the last contact with the previous administration, I tried to convince my previous American colleague that the situation should not be brought to the point of no return, when it would come to hostilities. And I said it quite directly back then that it's a big mistake," Putin said at a joint news conference. "Today, when President Trump is saying that if he had been the president back then, there would have been no war, and I'm quite sure that it would indeed be so. I can confirm that."
Anchorage hosted the first in-person talks between the Russian and US leaders since June 2021, when Putin met with then US President Joe Biden in Geneva. Putin became the first Russian leader to visit Alaska.
The US side hosted the Alaska summit under the slogan of 'Pursuing peace'.