Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday that there would be no war with Ukraine had President Donald Trump been in office in 2022.

“In 2022, during the last contact with the previous administration I tried to convince my previous American colleague that the situation should not be brought to the point of no return when it would come to hostilities and accept it quite directly back then; that’s a big mistake today,” Putin said through a translator Friday in a press conference at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, after his meeting with Trump to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine.

“When President Trump is saying that if he was the president back then there will be no war, I’m quite sure that it would indeed be so. I can confirm that I think that overall, me and President Trump have built a very good businesslike and trustworthy contact, and I have every reason to believe that moving down this path we can come, and the sooner the better to the end of the conflict in Ukraine,” he added.

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