CNN: Trump-Putin summit in Alaska came as surprise for American officials

American officials were both pleased and somewhat surprised when Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to meet President Donald Trump on US soil, setting the stage for a summit on August 15 in Anchorage, Alaska.

“I thought it was very respectful that the president of Russia is coming to our country as opposed to us going to his country or even a third-party place,” Trump said this week, as his team rushed to finalise the summit details, CNN writes. 

Officials scrambled over the weekend to identify and lock down a venue for the meeting, quickly concluding that the only city in the massive state with viable options was Anchorage. And only Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, on the northern edge of the city, met the stringent security requirements, though the White House had hoped to avoid the optics of hosting the Russian leader on a US military installation.

The choice of Alaska came after a lengthy behind-the-scenes back-and-forth between the Trump administration and the Kremlin, sources familiar with the matter said. Few locations were suitable for the summit, particularly given a war crimes warrant issued for Putin’s arrest by the International Criminal Court in 2023.

Russia reportedly balked at a European destination — even cities like Vienna or Geneva, where US and Russian leaders have met since the Cold War. Putin himself suggested the United Arab Emirates as an “entirely suitable” location, though many in the White House wanted to avoid another lengthy Middle East trip following Trump’s visit in May.

Ultimately, sources said the summit location was narrowed to either Hungary — whose Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has ties to both leaders — or the United States.

Not all observers were enthusiastic about the US location. 

“The only better place for Putin than Alaska would be if the summit were being held in Moscow,” said Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton, who clashed with the president during his first term. “So, the initial setup, I think, is a great victory for Putin.”

The last time an American president met with Putin — President Joe Biden’s 2021 summit in Geneva — the date and venue were announced three weeks ahead of time. During Trump’s first term, the two met one-on-one in Helsinki in 2018, a meeting that ended with Trump siding with Putin over “US intelligence agencies regarding election interference.” Their first encounter was in 2017 at the G20 summit in Hamburg.

In the days leading up to the meeting, Putin has reportedly called other global allies, including North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who met three times with Trump during his first term and remains a nuclear weapons holder. 

By Sabina Mammadli