A ‘peace bridge’ connecting Russia to America, worth £6 billion. This is the Kremlin’s latest moonshot, pitched directly to billionaire Elon Musk.
At the White House, Donald Trump appeared to hear about it for the first time – or at least did a convincing impression of it.
‘A tunnel from Russia to Alaska. That’s…interesting,’ the US president said, when asked about the idea by reporters during his meeting with Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky.
Asking Zelensky about the cross-border project, he said: ‘What do you think of that, Mr President?… How do you like that idea?’
The Ukrainian leader – who has been combating Russia’s war for more than three years – appeared less than thrilled.
‘I’m not happy with this,’ he warned, eliciting a laugh from his host.
The proposal by Kirill Dmitriev, Vladimir Putin’s investment envoy and head of Russia’s RDIF sovereign wealth fund, would see a rail tunnel built under the Bering Strait that separates the Russian Far East from Alaska.
He suggested that linking the two nations would unlock joint exploration of natural resources and ‘symbolise unity’.
In a post on X, the envoy claimed that the idea of a ‘peace bridge’ between Russia and Alaska dated back to the Cold War era.
Proposing that Musk is involved in the project with his company, Dmitriev said: ‘With modern @boringcompany technology this can become a Putin-Trump tunnel.’
In addition, he suggested that the US could join Russia and China in joint ‘hydrocarbon projects in the Arctic,’ referring to expanded drilling for oil.
‘Certainly, Russia is eyeing the opportunity of joint Russia-China-US projects, including in the Arctic region, specifically in the energy sector,’ he said last month, according to Russia’s TASS news agency.
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