U.S. President Donald Trump claimed that he would negotiate a ceasefire deal for Ukraine at his Alaska summit last Friday. Yet, he failed and found himself once again outplayed by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who got much of what he wanted from the White House while conceding fairly little. Though Trump now seems to support the idea of ceding a key Ukrainian province in exchange for giving Kyiv NATO-style security guarantees, the details here, or lack thereof, warrant a great deal of pessimism.

Expectations for the summit were low from the beginning amongst the Ukrainians I spoke with in Odesa, as well as influential online political commentators in the country, as many suspected that the event’s existence would simply delay harsher sanctions against Russia and its trading part

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