By Lucy Papachristou (Reuters) -In the early hours of Saturday morning following a summit in Alaska between the leaders of Russia and the United States, senior politicians in Moscow were quick to trumpet the meeting as a win for Russia and its narrative of the war in Ukraine.

With no ceasefire and an invitation to Moscow, the US and Russia's meeting yields more questions than answers.

Russia says it invaded Ukraine to halt Kyiv's ambitions to join NATO, the U.S.-led defensive alliance, which it saw as a major security threat. It also accuses Kyiv of persecuting ethnic Russians and their culture in Ukraine.