Ukraine says it has agreed a “framework” natural resources deal with the United States but the sums involved and the security guarantees that are crucial to Kyiv are still being discussed, amid intensifying efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said he could sign the deal in Washington this week with US counterpart Donald Trump, who is determined to recoup money spent on military and other aid for Kyiv by his predecessor, Joe Biden.
Mr Zelenskiy said he was satisfied with the “preliminary” deal but warned there would be no ceasefire without guarantees for Ukraine that Russia would not relaunch its full-scale invasion, as Moscow said it wanted more Ukrainian territory than it currently occupies and would not accept any western peacekeepers in the country.
Mr Trump, however, said he would not be giving Ukraine security guarantees “beyond - very much. We’re going to have Europe do that”. This was because “Europe is the next-door neighbour”, he said.
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The agreement foresees the creation of a fund, jointly managed by Ukraine and the US, to which Ukraine would contribute 50 per cent of future revenue from “monetisation of natural resources assets” and associated infrastructure, and which could invest in the post-war reconstruction of the country. The published draft did not state the size of the fund or what the US would contribute to or earn from it.
Mr Zelenskiy said the “main thing” for him was that deal did not refer to Ukraine as a debtor to the US, after Mr Trump made repeated unsubstantiated claims that Kyiv “owed” up to $500 billion (€477 billion) to Washington for aid provided by Mr Biden’s administration.
“I consider that we are partners there,” he said of plans for the fund, while describing the framework deal as only a first step to more substantive agreements with Washington.
“The next agreement will be more serious and complicated ... and will require ratification in the Ukrainian parliament ... The next agreements will clarify how the partnership could work,” Mr Zelenskiy said.
The published draft contains only vague wording about the US supporting “Ukraine’s efforts to obtain security guarantees needed to establish lasting peace” and how “the American people desire to invest alongside Ukraine in a free, sovereign and secure Ukraine.”
“This agreement could be part of future security guarantees ... we need to understand the broader vision,” Mr Zelenskiy said. “This deal could be a great success or it could pass quietly. And the big success depends on our conversation with President Trump.”
Mr Zelenskiy said this Friday was a “working date” for a possible visit to Washington to sign the deal, but warned that no ceasefire would be possible until security guarantees for Kyiv were in place. “We all need to understand that there will not simply be a ceasefire if Ukraine has no security guarantees ... The only way this war ends is if we know that it will not start again the next day,” he said.
Speaking later, however, at the first meeting of his cabinet, Mr Trump said Mr Zelenskiy’s visit on Friday was going ahead. “We’ll be really partnering with Ukraine in terms of rare earth. We very much need rare earth, they have great rare earth,” he said, adding that the deal would be worth “probably $350 billion” to the US and $100 billion to Europe.
Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said Russian and US diplomats would meet in Istanbul on Thursday to discuss expanding the operations of their embassies in each other’s countries, as Mr Trump seeks a rapprochement with Moscow.
He also said any peace deal could not freeze the front line at its current position, because Russia wants full control of four Ukrainian regions that are only partly occupied, and that Moscow would not consider “any options” that involved European peacekeepers overseeing a ceasefire.
