NEW YORK, August 20. /TASS/. The United States understands that it is impossible to resolve the Ukrainian conflict quickly, US Chief of Protocol Monica Crowley said.
"This is not going to happen overnight. We talked about the peace process in the Middle East. Peace is a process," she said in an interview broadcast by Fox News as she commented on the situation around Ukraine following the Russia-US summit in Anchorage and US President Donald Trump’s meetings with Vladimir Zelensky and European leaders in the White House.
Crowley noted "a very productive meeting between Presidents [of US Donald] Trump and [Vladimir] Putin" in Anchorage, adding that after "the meetings with President Putin in Alaska, and then, of course, yesterday (August 18 - TASS), with <…> Zelensky and all of the European leaders, there has been a change in the dynamic." "These two sets of meetings have been game changers for the peace process," she stressed.
On August 15, Putin and Trump met at a military base in Alaska. The conversation lasted about three hours, including a change of formats: one-on-one in the limo of the American leader on the way to the main meeting place and in a narrow three-on-three format. On the Russian side, Presidential Aide Yury Ushakov and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also took part in the meeting, while on the American side, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff. In a press statement following the talks, Putin said that the settlement of the Ukrainian conflict had become the main topic of the summit.
On Monday, Trump received Vladimir Zelensky and leaders of European countries. During the meeting in Washington, Trump made a phone call to Putin, with whom, the US president said, he discussed, among other things, the prospects for holding a meeting between the Russian leader and Zelensky, followed by trilateral negotiations. According to Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov, the leaders expressed support for continuing direct consultations between Moscow and Kiev, and the idea of elevating their level was also considered.