Zelenskyy meets with UK's Starmer as Europe braces for Trump-Putin
summit
[August 14, 2025]
By PAN PYLAS
LONDON (AP) — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer welcomed Ukrainian
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to London on Thursday in a show of the
U.K.'s support for Ukraine a day before a critical U.S.-Russia summit is
set to take place in Alaska.
The two embraced warmly outside Starmer’s offices at 10 Downing Street
without making any comments. Around an hour later, Starmer walked
Zelenskyy back to his waiting car, and the two leaders shared another
embrace as the Ukrainian president departed.
Zelenskyy's trip to the British capital came a day after he took part in
virtual meetings from Berlin with U.S. President Donald Trump and the
leaders of several European countries.
Those leaders said Trump had assured them he would make a priority of
trying to achieve a ceasefire in Ukraine when he meets with Russian
President Vladimir Putin on Friday in Anchorage.
Both Zelenskyy and the Europeans have worried the bilateral U.S.-Russia
summit would leave them and their interests sidelined. They fear that
any conclusions reached could favor Moscow, leaving Ukraine and Europe's
future security in jeopardy with Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine
now in its fourth year.
Yet some of those leaders, like German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and
French President Emmanuel Macron, praised Wednesday's video conference
with Trump as constructive. Speaking after the meetings to reporters,
Trump warned of “very severe consequences” for Russia if Putin does not
agree to stop the war against Ukraine after Friday's meeting.
Territorial integrity
The Kremlin on Thursday said the meeting between Trump and Putin in
Alaska will start at 11:30 a.m. local time. Putin’s foreign policy
advisor, Yuri Ushakov, told reporters that Trump and Putin will first
sit down for a one-on-one meeting.
Aside from Putin, the Russian delegation will include Foreign Minister
Sergey Lavrov, Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, Finance Minister Anton
Siluanov and the head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund Kirill Dmitriev.
Following the meetings between Trump and Putin and their delegations,
the two leaders will hold a joint press conference, Ushakov said.
Starmer on Wednesday said the Alaska summit would be “hugely important,”
and could be a “viable” path to a ceasefire in Ukraine. But he also
alluded to European concerns that Trump may strike a deal that forces
Ukraine to cede territory to Russia, and warned that Western allies must
be prepared to step up pressure on Russia if necessary.
During a call Wednesday among leaders of countries involved in the
“coalition of the willing” — those who are prepared to help police any
future peace agreement between Moscow and Kyiv — Starmer stressed that
any deal reached on bringing the fighting to an end must protect the
“territorial integrity” of Ukraine.
“International borders cannot be, and must not be changed by force,’’ he
said, adding that robust security guarantees must accompany any
ceasefire to "ensure that any peace, if there is peace, is lasting peace
and Ukraine can defend its territorial integrity.”
Macron: Trump willing to share in security guarantees
Kyiv has long insisted that safeguards against future Russian attacks
provided by its Western allies would be a precondition for achieving a
durable end to the fighting in Ukraine. Yet many Western governments
have been hesitant to commit to engaging their military personnel.
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Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer, left, talks with Ukraine's
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the garden of 10 Downing Street in
London, Thursday Aug. 14, 2025. (Ben Stansall/Pool Photo via AP)
Countries in the “coalition of the willing,” which include France
and the U.K., have been trying for months to secure U.S. security
backing should it be required. Following Wednesday's virtual
meetings, Macron said Trump told the assembled leaders that while
NATO must not be part of future security guarantees, “the United
States and all the parties involved should take part.”
“It’s a very important clarification that we have received,” Macron
said.
Trump did not reference any U.S. commitments to providing security
guarantees during his comments to reporters on Wednesday.
Some Ukrainians skeptical
With another high-level meeting on their country's future on the
horizon, some Ukrainians expressed skepticism that any breakthroughs
would be achieved during Friday's U.S.-Russia summit.
Oleksandra Kozlova, 39, who works at a digital agency in Kyiv, told
The Associated Press on Wednesday that she believes Ukrainians “have
already lost hope” that meaningful progress can be made on ending
the 3 1/2-year-old war.
“I don’t think this round will be decisive,” she said. "There have
already been enough meetings and negotiations promising us, ordinary
people, that something will be resolved, that things will get
better, that the war will end. Unfortunately, this has not happened,
so personally I don’t see any changes coming.”
Anton Vyshniak, a car salesman in Kyiv, said Ukraine's priority now
should be saving the lives of its military servicepeople, even at
the expense of making territorial concessions.
“At the moment, the most important thing is to preserve the lives of
male and female military personnel. After all, there are not many
human resources left," he said. "Borders are borders, but human
lives are priceless. Therefore, some principles can be disregarded
here.”
Russia and Ukraine trade strikes
Russian strikes in Ukraine’s Sumy region overnight Wednesday
resulted in numerous injuries, Ukrainian regional officials said. A
missile strike on a village in the Seredyna-Budska community injured
a 7-year-old girl and a 27-year-old man, according to regional
governor Oleh Hryhorov. The girl was hospitalized in stable
condition.
In the southern Kherson region, Russian artillery fire struck the
village of Molodizhne on Thursday morning, injuring a 16-year-old
boy, regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin said.
In Russia, an oil refinery in the Volgograd region caught fire after
a Ukrainian drone attack overnight, according to local governor
Andrei Bocharov. The refinery, one of the biggest producers of
petroleum products in southern Russia, has been a frequent target of
drone attacks, according to Russian independent news site Meduza.
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Associated Press writers Lorne Cook in Brussels, Hanna Arhirova in
Kyiv, Ukraine and Dasha Litvinova in Tallinn, Estonia contributed.
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