Trump and Putin set for Alaska showdown as sidelined Zelensky waits to discover Ukraine’s fate: Live updates

Speaking in the Oval Office on the eve of today’s summit, Trump insisted Putin ‘is not going to mess around with me’.

The President said he would be able to know if the meeting is likely to prove productive in the first few minutes, adding it could end ‘very quickly’ if it isn’t.

Asked if he felt Putin has a ‘strong hand’, Mr Trump said: ‘Well, he came to our country.’

He said he believes the dictator ‘would like to see a deal’ adding:

If I weren’t president, in my opinion, he would much rather take over all of Ukraine but I am president and he’s not going to mess around with me.

He also blamed Russia for the war, saying: ‘Everybody’s to blame, Putin is to blame, they’re all to blame.’

Earlier yesterday, he gave himself a 75 per cent chance of success in his one-on-one. He told Fox News:

This meeting sets up like a chess game. This meeting sets up a second meeting, but there is a 25 per cent chance that this meeting will not be a successful meeting.

Trump meets Putin today for talks filled with intrigue, fraught with risk and carrying the potential for serious consequences for the future of the grinding war in Ukraine.

Foreign policy experts exclusively tell the Daily Mail that Putin’s strategy in Anchorage on Friday will be to isolate Trump from Ukraine and Europe and turn the US from a loyal supporter into a mere bystander.

Whether Trump emerges from the meeting smitten, seething or skeptical will determine whether another meeting’s in the cards or if the president has finally reached the end of his patience with Putin’s three-and-a-half year invasion.

Given the stakes, experts say it’s no surprise the White House is furiously trying to tamp down expectations for any immediate progress and characterizing Friday as ‘feel-out’ session.

‘The Kremlin’s strategy in Ukraine is to reduce the conflict into a one-on-one matchup,’ said Peter Rough of the Hudson Institute. ‘Putin will want to sidestep US sanctions and rebuild relations with Trump … If he can drive a wedge between the US and Europe, all the better.’

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President Donald Trump is expected to depart the White House just before 7 am ET before flying roughly eight hours from Washington, D.C., to Anchorage, Alaska.

The Republican is scheduled to travel to Joint Base Andrews before boarding Air Force One.

If Trump speaks to the press before his departure, it would likely be from the tarmac of JBA.

All the timings you need to know ahead of today’s summit in Alaska

Trump is expected to leave the White House for Anchorage which is estimated to be between a seven and eight hour flight. It is unknown when Putin will depart from Moscow for the Alaska’s largest city. Flight time will be around nine hours.

The leaders are scheduled to begin face-to-face talks at a ‘working breakfast’ in the the Elmendorf Air Force Base, the largest US military installation in Alaska and a Cold War base for surveillance of the Soviet Union. The Kremlin has said a press conference will take place following the talks

Trump is expected to leave Anchorage and return to the White House

Good morning and welcome to our live coverage on what is an historic day as Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin meet in Alaska for a high-stakes summit which may signal the outcome of the three-year war between Russia and Ukraine.

After insisting he could bring a swift resolution to the conflict upon re-entering the White House in January this year, Trump will hope to secure a peace agreement with the Russian leader.

But one notable absentee from today’s talks in Anchorage is Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky who will be waiting nervously next to a phone tonight to hear the outcome.

Stick with us throughout the day as we bring you the latest news, analysis and reaction from our reporters in London and New York.