Donald Trump says there will likely be a second meeting with Vladimir Putin that includes Volodymyr Zelenskyy after their summit on Friday without the Ukrainian leader. He threatened Putin with “severe consequences” if he didn’t agree to a ceasefire. Follow the latest below.
Wednesday 13 August 2025 17:52, UK
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has shared an image of the room where “excellent” talks took place between EU leaders, Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump.
“There is real hope for peace in Ukraine,” he posted on X.
“We want President Trump to succeed in Alaska — and we Europeans are doing everything we can to set these talks on the right track.”
Donald Trump is asked during his news conference whether Russia will face any consequences if Vladimir Putin doesn’t agree to stop the war in Ukraine after their meeting in Alaska on Friday.
The US president replies: “Yes, they will. There will be consequences.”
Asked if that would be sanctions or tariffs, Trump says: “I don’t have to say. There will be very severe consequences.”
He is then asked if he believes he can convince Putin to stop targeting civilians in Ukraine, and he says he does not, saying he has asked previously, but it has not happened.
Donald Trump says that a “quick second meeting” between Vladimir Putin, Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump will likely follow the summit in Alaska on Friday.
“There’s a very good chance we’re going to have a second meeting which will be more productive than the first because the first is I am going to find out where we are and what we are doing,” says Trump, answering questions at the Kennedy Centre in Washington.
Trump said if the first meeting with Putin on Friday “goes ok” then there will be a “quick second one” between Putin and Zelenskyy “and myself if they’d like to have me there”.
He added: “There may be no second meeting because if I feel that it is not appropriate to have it because I didn’t get the answers that we have to have, then we’re not going to have a second meeting”.
EU leaders have been reacting to today’s talks with Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump, ahead of the US leader’s summit with Vladimir Putin on Friday.
Finland’s President Alexander Stubb said the next few days and weeks could be decisive in the Ukraine peace process.
Poland’s President Karol Nawrocki’s foreign policy adviser said a final resolution on the Ukraine war must come with the involvement of Ukraine.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said it was a “very good call”.
“Today Europe, the US and NATO have strengthened the common ground for Ukraine.
“We will remain in close coordination. Nobody wants peace more than us, a just and lasting peace.”
Sir Keir Starmer is chairing a meeting of the “coalition of the willing”, a group of countries prepared to help police any future peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine.
Opening the meeting, he said a “military plan” is ready to do so once a ceasefire is agreed.
The Trump-Putin summit on Friday is “hugely important”, he added.
“For three-and-a-bit years this conflict has been going on and we haven’t got anywhere near the prospect of actually a viable solution, a viable way of bringing it to a ceasefire – and now we do have that chance because of the work that the president has put in.”
Nothing is guaranteed from the meeting in Alaska on Friday, Starmer added, but said the “coalition of the willing” is ready to deploy a “reassurance force” when the moment arises, or impose sanctions where needed.
Ahead of the meeting with Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday, Donald Trump joined a meeting with European leaders.
According to the German chancellor, the European side set out five principles to the US president ahead of the talks.
Those are:
Friedrich Merz added that if there is “no movement on the Russian side” during the talks in Alaska on Friday, then “the US and Europeans need to increase the pressure”.
A “coalition of the willing” meeting is now taking place, Sky News understands.
The term refers to those nations who are prepared to help police any future peace agreement between Moscow and Kyiv.
The meeting is chaired by Keir Starmer, who has led efforts in this area with French President Emmanuel Macron.
German Chancellor Merz says Europe knows that Ukraine “needs security guarantees” and “that we will have to support the Ukrainian army to defend their country”.
Details of these guarantees weren’t discussed today with Donald Trump but that will have to follow “once the way towards peace has been opened”, he says.
While taking questions, Volodymyr Zelenskyy added: “It seems to me that the success of any talks depends first of all on the results and the mood and our mood now is that we are united and it was very positive.”
He added that all the partners expressed “the same vision and this is an important step forward”.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy is asked whether his position on surrendering the eastern Donbas region had changed following today’s negotiations.
Vladimir Putin reportedly wants control of the region in exchange for any ceasefire.
Zelenskyy said his “position hasn’t changed because it’s based on the Ukrainian constitution and the Ukrainian constitution hasn’t changed”.
He adds: “Any questions concerning our country’s territorial integrity cannot be discussed without regard for our people, for the will of our people and the Ukrainian constitution”.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy opens his comments by thanking the German chancellor for hosting him for the meeting today, and for Germany’s wider contribution to Ukrainian security.
He says all the leaders who met today wanted “peace in Ukraine, peace in Europe”.
They agreed on a set of principles ahead of Donald Trump’s talks with Vladimir Putin on Friday, he explains, and emphasises: “What concerns Ukraine must be discussed with Ukraine.”
He goes on to say that Trump supports a ceasefire and security guarantees for Ukraine, and adds: “Russia should not have the right to veto Ukraine’s NATO prospects.”
“There should joint pressure on Russia, there should be sanctions, and there should be a message that if Russia doesn’t agree to a ceasefire in Alaska, this principle should work,” he says.
Zelenskyy goes on to say that he told Trump and European leaders that “Putin is bluffing – he is trying to push forward along the whole front”.
“Putin is also bluffing saying he doesn’t care about the sanctions and that they’re not working,” he says.
“In reality, the sanctions are very effective, and they’re hurting the Russian military economy.”
Zelenskyy goes on to say that he also said in the meeting that “Putin doesn’t want peace – he wants to occupy our country”.
He calls for US and European sanctions, saying they are a crucial was to “stop Putin’s war”.
On the Trump-Putin meeting, he adds: “We hope that the central theme will be a ceasefire. The United States president said this several times.
“He proposed to me that after the meeting in Alaska, we’ll have contact and discuss all the results, if they are achieved, and we’ll define future steps.”
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