On Friday, Russian President Vladimir Putin will fly to Alaska to meet with US President Donald Trump in a meeting that might change everything.
This summit is important for geopolitics since it is happening while there is still a war in Ukraine, and Putin is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes.
In 2023, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Putin on charges of war crimes, including the abduction and trafficking of Ukrainian children.
This makes me think about an important question: Can the police arrest Putin while he is in Alaska meeting with Trump? Military expert Hamish de Bretton-Gordon says that the situation is problematic because of the US’s position on the ICC.
The ICC doesn’t have any power over the US, thus he can go to Alaska. That’s the way out. He can do whatever he wants. He told The Sun that he wouldn’t have gone someplace where he would have been arrested.
This shows that the US, along with Russia, China, Pakistan, and a few other nations, has not signed the ICC framework. This means that Putin would not be arrested in the US even though there are warrants out for his arrest.
The fact that Alaska is between the US and Russia makes the meeting even more important. The fact that the state is so close to Russian land is especially interesting; the two countries are only a few miles apart by water.
De Bretton-Gordon asserts that Putin’s decision to meet Trump in Alaska isn’t only an attempt to stay out of legal hot water.The analyst said that Putin is completely obsessed with his own safety and doesn’t want to leave friendly airspace. Alaska doesn’t have much of that; it would only be in international airspace for a few kilometers.
The Russian leader might also consider this as a return to a region that has historically been under Russian control. For example, Alaska was part of the Tsardom of Russia before being transferred to the United States in 1867.
Putin’s choice of site for the summit is smart, but it’s still unclear who will be there. At first, there were indications that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky may come to the conference, but the Kremlin promptly dismissed these allegations.
One person from the White House even said that the whole conference might be called off if Zelensky wasn’t there. Trump later said the opposite, saying he was glad to meet with Putin nevertheless.
As of now, it looks like just Trump and Putin will be at the meeting. Zelensky’s absence makes people worry that Ukraine’s interests won’t be properly represented.
de Bretton-Gordon said that Zelensky is the most important individual in all of this. I don’t think there’s much faith that anything that President Zelensky and the people of Ukraine will agree on will be decided.
The fact that the Ukrainian leader is not there could suggest that the peace talks are not making any real progress, and that the conclusion could be better for Russia than for Ukraine.
Alaska’s role as the host of this summit is important not only because of where it is, but also because of its history. Governor Mike Dunleavy emphasized Alaska’s global significance, stating that it is the world’s most strategically located state. With the Pacific to the south and the Arctic to the north, it is situated at the meeting point of Asia and North America.
Because of where it is, Alaska makes sense as a place for a meeting between two world powers.
The Russian media has said that the summit was a win for Putin, saying it was a symbol of diplomatic achievement and a blow to Zelensky’s power.
But it also gives Trump a chance to show that he is a leader, especially because the US is hosting Putin.
Trump’s choice to stay in Washington while Putin flies to Alaska is important because it puts the responsibility on the Russian leader to travel.
We still don’t know what the real aim of the summit was or what it accomplished. De Bretton-Gordon, a former British Army officer, said that the fact that the conference is happening at all is an accomplishment, but it’s still not apparent who is in charge. He remarked that it has been relatively evident until recently that President Putin does not want peace at all. His goal at the start of his special military operation more than three and a half years ago was to take over all of Ukraine.
De Bretton-Gordon, on the other hand, thinks that Trump might suddenly see how Putin is trying to trick him, which could change US strategy. The analyst said that this is why I think Putin has come to the table: if Trump goes through with his sanctions and tariffs. The economic strain on Russia, especially as the country depends on oil exports, could affect the course of any peace talks.
Even though things are changing, Putin still has the upper hand in the military, as Russian troops continue to move forward in Ukraine. De Bretton-Gordon said that Russia seemed to be moving forward slowly. Attacking civilian targets in Ukraine on an incredible scale. This shows how complicated the summit is. Trump may want to make a deal, but it could hurt Ukraine and its people.
In the end, the summit will only be successful if the conversations go well and both leaders can agree on something. Zelensky’s absence makes things less clear because he would have been important in making sure that any deal was really good for Ukraine. A bad agreement for Ukraine is worse than no deal at all, according to de Bretton-Gordon.