Trump says Putin ‘wants to get it done’ at tomorrow’s Alaska summit, as he floats idea of second meeting with Zelenskyy – Europe live

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European leaders have praised President Donald Trump for agreeing to allow US military support for a force they are mustering to police any future peace in Ukraine – a move that vastly improves the chances of success for an operation that could prove essential for the country’s security.

The leaders said Trump offered American military backup for the European “reassurance force” during a call they held with him ahead of his planned summit with Russian president Vladimir Putin on Friday, AP reported. They did not say what the assistance might involve and Trump himself has not publicly confirmed any support.

The effectiveness of the operation, drawn up by the coalition of about 30 countries supporting Ukraine, hinges on the deterrent effect of US air power or other military equipment that European armed forces do not have, or have only in short supply.

No US troops would be involved, but the threat of American air power, if needed, behind the European force would likely help to dissuade Russian troops from testing Europe’s resolve.

Senior Russian officials have repeatedly rejected the idea of European peacekeepers in Ukraine, even though a traditional UN-style peacekeeping force is not being planned.

Trump: Second Putin meeting will be 'very, very important'

Donald Trump has told Fox News Radio that the second meeting between him and Vladimir Putin would be “very, very important”.

The US president has indicated that any future meeting, where a deal would be struck on key details such as territory, would involved the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

“The second meeting is going to be very, very important, because that’s going to be a meeting where they make a deal. And I don’t want to use the word ‘divvy’ things up. But you know, to a certain extent, it’s not a bad term, okay?” Trump told Fox News Radio.

That’s all from me, Jakub Krupa, for today, but Tom Ambrose is here to take you through the late afternoon and bring you the latest ahead of the Trump-Putin summit tomorrow.

'We'll do best we can,' Trump promises ahead of Putin summit

Meanwhile, Trump’s interview with Fox News Radio has just wrapped up, with Trump signing off with a promise on tomorrow’s Alaska meeting with Putin:

“We’ll do the best we can, and I think we’ll have a good result in the end.”

Security guarantees, territorial disputes all part of talk about Ukraine, Rubio says

Separately, US state secretary Marco Rubio said that security guarantees for Ukraine needed to be part of peace talks with Russia, adding he was hopeful of imminent progress towards ending the war, AFP reported.

Ahead of the Trump-Putin summit on Friday, Rubio said that “to achieve peace, I think we all recognise that there’ll have to be some conversation about security guarantees.”

“There’ll have to be some conversation about ... territorial disputes and claims, and what they’re fighting over,” he added, Reuters said.

On a future ceasefire, he said, “we’ll see what’s possible tomorrow.

Let’s see how the talks go. And we’re hopeful.

'25%' chance meeting with Putin will end in failure if there's no second meeting with Zelenskyy, Trump says

Trump got also asked if he thought there was a chance of the meeting ending in failure.

In response, he said he saw it as 25%.

He said the main aim of tomorrow’s summit was to set up a second meeting – involving Zelenskyy – to make a deal, comparing it to “a chess game.”

He argued it would include “a give and take as to boundaries, lands.”

He then said:

“There is a 25% chance that this meeting will not be a successful meeting, in which case I will [return to] run the country and we have made America great again already in six months.”

He also suggested he could follow up with sanctions on Russia in that scenario.

Trump says Putin 'wants to get it done,' as he once again floats another meeting with Zelenskyy

US president Donald Trump is speaking to Fox News Radio right now, and he has just said that he thought Russian president Vladimir Putin “wants to get it done” at tomorrow’s summit in Alaska.

Asked if his threats of sanctions may have influenced Putin’s decision to agree to a meeting, he said:

“Everything has an impact,” as he added that secondary tariffs against India “essentially took them out of buying oil from Russia.”

“Certainly, when you lose your second largest customer and you’re probably going to lose your first largest customer, I think that probably has a role,” he said.

Trump got also asked if he was ready to provide “economic incentives” to Russia to stop fighting in Ukraine, but he declined to say, explaining he wouldn’t “want to play my hand in public.”

He repeatedly said that Russia had “a tremendous potential,” with value in “oil and gas, a very profitable business.”

But Trump stressed he was primarily interested in making progress with Putin, and he would then immediately call Zelenskyy to “get him over to wherever we are going to meet.”

“We have an idea of three different locations,” he said, adding “including the possibility, because it would be by far the easiest, of staying in Alaska.”

“If it’s a bad meeting, I’m not calling anybody. I’m going home.

But if it’s a good meeting, I’m going to call President Zelensky and the European leaders.”

Addressing the reports he could hold a joint press conference with Putin, he said:

“I’m going to have a press conference. I don’t know if it’s going to be a joint. We haven’t even discussed it. I think it might be nice to have a joint, and then separates.”

But he then added that he would hold a press conference in any scenario, even if the talks collapse.

No plans to sign documents at Alaska summit, Kremlin reportedly says, warning against predicting outcome of talks

We are just getting some lines from Russia in what appears to be an attempt to manage expectations ahead of tomorrow’s Trump-Putin meeting in Alaska.

The Kremlin, via the Russian news agency Interfax, has said there are no plans to sign documents on the outcome of the summit, and warned it would be “a big mistake” to predict outcome of the talks, Reuters reported.

Serbia see clashes between pro-government groups and anti-graft protesters

In other news across Europe, the situation in Serbia merits renewed attention as large groups of pro-government supporters, most wearing masks, confronted groups taking part in long-running anti-graft protests run by student movements, AFP reported.

AFP noted that the worst violence was reported in parts of Belgrade and Novi Sad, where the protest movement first began, with dozens injured and arrested.

One man, later identified as a military police officer, fired a pistol into the air as protesters approached the ruling party’s offices in Novi Sad, causing panic.

Footage also showed supporters of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party launching fireworks at protesters gathered outside the party’s headquarters there.

Since November, near-daily protests have taken place over the collapse of a train station in Novi Sad. The tragedy, which killed 16 people, soon became a flashpoint as people across the country seized on it to demand greater government transparency and express their broader dissatisfaction with Serbia’s increasingly authoritarian rule.

The agency said that over the past nine months, thousands of mostly peaceful, student-led demonstrations have been held, some attracting hundreds of thousands.

But it added that this week’s violence however marks a significant escalation and indicates the increasing strain on Aleksandar Vučić’s populist government, in power for 13 years.

Russian senior delegation to Alaska shows Putin means business — snap analysis

Russian affairs reporter

Putin’s delegation has been announced (11:20) and, unsurprisingly, the Russian leader will be flanked by some of the most powerful figures in the Kremlin’s inner circle – seasoned political operators, financial strategists and diplomatic enforcers who have shaped Russia’s foreign and economic policy for more than two decades.

The mix of old-guard loyalists and younger financial power-brokers points to Putin’s aim of wooing Trump’s ear and dangling financial incentives for siding with Moscow on Ukraine.

Notably, alongside a cadre of veteran diplomats, Putin is bringing two prominent economic advisers.

The presence of finance minister Anton Siluanov is particularly striking: he has overseen Russia’s response to sweeping western sanctions, the lifting of which the Kremlin has repeatedly set as a central condition for any peace deal.

Meanwhile, let’s take a closer look at tomorrow’s Trump-Putin summit and at the Russian delegation attending with the Russian president.

Over to our Russian affairs reporter, Pjotr Sauer.

Climate change exacerbating severity of fires across Europe, experts say

Europe environment correspondent

The deadly fires come as southern Europe suffers intense heat that has broken temperature records across the continent – made worse by fossil fuel pollution that traps sunlight and heats the planet – and which has dried out vegetation.

“It’s obvious that climate change is exacerbating the severity of fires,” said Eduardo Rojas Briales, a forestry researcher at the Polytechnic University of Valencia and former deputy director general of the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization. “But it’s not responsible to wait for greenhouse gas emissions to drop … as the sole approach to addressing the problem.”

He called for additional policies such as ensuring dead plant material is kept at manageable levels, creating gaps in vegetation, for instance through reversing rural abandonment, and using prescribed burning.

“There is no alternative but to build landscapes … that are truly resilient to fires,” he said.

A report published Thursday by XDI, a climate risk analysis group, found that the climate crisis has doubled the risk of infrastructure damage from forest fires in France, Italy, Greece, Romania and Bulgaria since 1990. It predicted risk would increase further still in future.

“We’re all asking ourselves, how much worse can it get?,” said Karl Mallon, XDI’s head of science and technology.

“According to our latest analysis, a lot.”