Trump, Xi and Putin plan an unprecedented joint meeting on the sidelines of APEC, officials say

The White House confirmed Saturday that President Donald Trump will sit down with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the APEC summit in China next week. The meeting, scheduled for November 19, marks the first time the three leaders have gathered together in a formal trilateral format. Nuclear non-proliferation is expected to dominate the discussion, according to multiple officials briefed on the planning. The Kremlin had signaled the possibility as early as October, with spokesman Dmitry Peskov saying the idea had been raised but no agenda finalized.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha sharply criticized the format, arguing on X that a U.S.-Russia-China summit without Kyiv would "encourage Putin to continue this war." Peskov acknowledged that any final peace settlement would require Ukraine's participation, but the trilateral meeting itself appears designed to bypass Kyiv. The last U.S.-mediated peace talks between Russia and Ukraine collapsed in February, before the Iran conflict erupted, and the two sides remain far apart on terms. Meanwhile, the Jensen Huang espionage scandal — involving allegations that a woman who had an affair with the Nvidia CEO was a Chinese asset — has roiled U.S. intelligence circles, though officials say Trump does not plan to raise it with Xi.

The APEC setting in China gives Xi home-field advantage and underscores Beijing's growing role as a diplomatic convener. For Trump, the summit offers a high-stakes stage to project dealmaking authority ahead of the 2028 election cycle. For Putin, it's a chance to legitimize Russia's great-power status despite Western isolation efforts. But the absence of a clear agenda beyond proliferation — and the exclusion of Ukraine — raises questions about whether the meeting will produce concrete outcomes or serve mainly as symbolic theater. European allies, who recently agreed on a joint team for future talks with Russia, were not invited and have expressed private unease about being sidelined.

What happens after the handshakes may matter more than the meeting itself. If the three leaders agree on a framework for nuclear dialogue — potentially including Iran — it could open a diplomatic channel that has been frozen for years. But if the summit devolves into competing narratives with no follow-through, it risks deepening mistrust among the very powers needed to manage the world's most dangerous flashpoints.