The minimum spanning tree cut property, in its safe-edge form, says: if an edge set is contained in some minimum spanning tree, a cut of a graph respects , and is a light edge crossing a cut, then is contained in some minimum spanning tree.
Choose an MST containing . If , nothing changes. Otherwise adding creates its unique fundamental cycle. The path in between the endpoints of must cross the chosen cut; take such an edge . Since the cut respects , . Since is light, . The exchange is a spanning tree containing , with total weight no greater than that of . Minimality of forces equal optimum weight, proving the claim. Equal edge weights cause no difficulty: “safe” means belonging to some compatible optimum, not to every optimum.
A cut of a graph is a partition into two nonempty vertex sets. An edge crosses it when its endpoints lie on opposite sides. An edge set respecting a cut contains no crossing edge. A light edge crossing a cut has minimum weight among all crossing edges; there can be several tied light edges. These definitions concern the graph's weighted edges, independently of any particular spanning tree.
True. Delete ; the resulting two connected components define a cut of a graph. If a crossing edge had , the exchange would be a spanning tree of smaller total weight, contradicting the minimum spanning tree assumption. Thus is a light edge crossing a cut for this fundamental cut. It need not be uniquely light.