MOSCOW, August 13. /TASS/. The upcoming meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US leader Donald Trump in Alaska will mark a significant step forward, offering an opportunity to end the conflict in Ukraine, former US Marine Corps intelligence officer and ex-UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter told TASS.
"I hope there's peace in Ukraine after this summit. This is a very difficult issue, and it's one that will require difficult solutions," he said.
Ritter emphasized that Russia and the US are now engaged in dialogue. "That's an improvement right off the bat. The fact that we have President Trump and President Putin agreeing to meet face-to-face to talk. They've had, what, three conversations on the telephone? That's significant, but now they're going to meet face-to-face," he noted.
"Do I believe that all of these solutions can be manifested in a single meeting in Alaska? No, I don't believe that. But what I do know is a year ago, no American official was talking to a Russian official, and the American policy in Ukraine was to continue to provide billions of dollars of weaponry and financial assistance to continue a conflict that was killing hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians, thousands of Russians, and was bringing our two nations, the United States and Russia, dangerously close to war," Ritter said.
