Ukraine-US sign memorandum on minerals deal

Ukraine and the US signed on Thursday a memorandum in what is considered an initial step towards clinching a long-drawn-out minerals agreement between the two nations, as part of US efforts to bring an end to the Russia-Ukraine war.

The document paves the way towards an “economic partnership agreement and the establishment of the investment fund for the reconstruction of Ukraine,” Ukraine’s first deputy prime minister and economy minister Yulia Svyrydenko, said in a thread on X.

The memorandum signing follows remarks by US President Donald Trump earlier in the day that a deal on Ukraine’s critical minerals will be signed next Thursday.

Present at the memorandum signing was US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who was the first cabinet-level official in Trump’s administration to visit Ukraine earlier this year to hold initial talks. Bessent hinted earlier that the deal would be signed around April 26.

“We have a minerals deal which I guess is going to be signed on Thursday,” Trump said during a meeting with Italian Prime Minster Giorgia Meloni in the Oval Office. “And I assume they’re going to live up to the deal.”

A draft of the deal under discussion earlier this month would give the US access to Ukraine’s mineral deposits and require Kyiv to place all its income from the exploitation of natural resources in a joint investment fund. Ukraine holds sizable deposits of critical minerals, including rare earth elements that are essential to a variety of high-tech applications, as well as graphite, lithium, titanium and uranium.

The partnership accord would see the US have first claim on profits transferred into a special reconstruction investment fund under its control. Kyiv has been pressing for better terms in the negotiations, including US security guarantees, and had refused to recognize the past US aid as debt.

After a new round of talks, the Trump administration has agreed to bring down its estimated assistance to Kyiv since the start of Russia’s invasion closer to Ukraine’s own estimate of $90 billion, Bloomberg reported.

Still, even with a deal in the offing, Trump remains critical of Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, with whom he had a heated exchange late February in the White House when the two parties had planned to sign a deal.

“I don’t hold Zelenskiy responsible but I’m not exactly thrilled with the fact that war started,” Trump said, referring to his Ukrainian counterpart’s role in its fight with Russia.