Putin heaps praise on ‘sincere’ Trump, hints Russia and US could strike nuclear arms deal

Russian President Vladimir Putin lauded the Trump administration’s “energetic” and “sincere” efforts to end the war in Ukraine — and suggested the US and Russia could reach a deal on nuclear arms control at their summit in Alaska on Friday.

Putin appeared optimistic that forthcoming meetings in Anchorage between Moscow and Washington could “create long-term conditions for peace between our countries, as well as in Europe, and in the world as a whole,” he told senior officials during a briefing on Thursday.

“The current American administration… is making, in my opinion, quite energetic and sincere efforts to stop the hostilities, stop the crisis and reach agreements that are of interest to all parties involved in this conflict,” Putin said, according to CNN.

A possible peace deal is possible if the US and Russia can “reach agreements in the area of control over strategic offensive weapons,” Putin said, referring to nuclear arms.

The US and Russia signed a pact in 2011, known as New START, capping strategic nuclear weapons deployments.

The deal expires on February 5, 2026.

New START has been tested by Russia’s war in Ukraine and has been on life support for since Putin announced Russia would no longer comply with its requirements in February.

The treaty limits each country to no more than 1,550 deployed nuclear warheads and 700 deployed missiles and bombers.

However, Putin —  a former KGB agent known as a master manipulator — has repeatedly shown he cannot be trusted.

Trump has grown increasingly frustrated with the Russian dictator, accusing him of “tapping” him along and has railed against his “bulls–t.”

“We get a lot of bulls–t thrown at us by Putin, if you want to know the truth,” Trump said last month. “He’s very nice all of the time, but it turns out to be meaningless.”

With Post Wires