In a summit meeting marked by red carpets, handshakes and military flyovers, President Vladimir Putin made his first trip to the United States in a decade and was greeted warmly by President Donald Trump.

President Donald Trump said on social media Saturday that a deal better than “a mere Ceasefire” is in the works with Vladimir Putin, hours after Trump’s high-stakes summit with the Russian leader in Alaska failed to produce an agreement to halt Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The meeting represented a diplomatic victory for Putin after Western leaders ostracized him at the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Just a week earlier, Trump was threatening him with new sanctions.

FROM THE moment he stepped off his plane onto the red-carpeted tarmac, the summit in Alaska was a triumph for Vladimir Putin. He was greeted with applause from his host, Donald Trump. The two men may have had nothing to announce after hours of talks—the first meeting between a Russian and American president since the invasion of Ukraine—but the encounter at the Elmendorf-Richardson military base in Anchorage transformed Mr Putin from a pariah of the West into an honoured guest on American soil.