President Trump said Wednesday that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will travel to Washington on Friday to sign a bilateral economic development and mineral-sharing pact.
Considerable uncertainty remains over the details and how the deal will affect Kyiv’s 3-year-old war to stave off a Russian invasion.
Mr. Trump has pressed for an economic pact to give U.S. interests a claim on Ukraine’s critical mineral sector. He describes it in part as “payback” for the tens of billions of dollars in U.S. military and development aid provided to Ukraine since Russia invaded in February 2022.
Earlier this month, Mr. Zelenskyy’s government rejected an offer that Mr. Trump said would be worth $500 billion to the United States. Ukraine said the price was too high, and Kyiv was seeking ironclad security guarantees from the U.S. in exchange for any economic deal.
“Ukraine President Zelenskyy is going to be coming on Friday. That’s now confirmed, and we’re going to be signing an agreement, which will be a very big agreement,” Mr. Trump said Wednesday at the first Cabinet meeting of his second term.
Reports said Kyiv was balking at some provisions of the accord, which would give U.S. mining interests access to hundreds of billions of dollars worth of Ukraine’s rare earth and strategic minerals, including some of Europe’s largest deposits of lithium, uranium and other elements key to high-tech applications.
During the Biden administration, Ukraine proposed a joint economic development pact, including joint exploitation of its mineral riches. Mr. Trump has raised the stakes by opening direct talks with Russia on ways to end the war.
One critical question remains: What security guarantees will the Trump administration be willing to offer as part of the deal? Mr. Zelenskyy says the guarantees must be included, but Mr. Trump suggested that Europe, not the United States, will protect Ukraine.
“I’m not going to make security guarantees beyond very much. We’re going to have Europe do that.”
Mr. Zelenskyy told a Wednesday press conference in Kyiv, “If we don’t get security guarantees, we won’t have a ceasefire. Nothing will work, nothing.”
The Associated Press, citing what it called the proposed draft text, reported that Washington and Kyiv were looking to establish a co-owned, managed investment fund to finance the massive rebuilding needs of a postwar Ukraine.
The wording on security and military assistance was vague, AP said. According to the document, the U.S. “supports Ukraine’s efforts to obtain security guarantees needed to establish lasting peace,” and Washington has “a long-term financial commitment to the development of a stable and economically prosperous Ukraine.”
“Participants will seek to identify any necessary steps to protect mutual investments as defined in the Fund agreement,” it states. “The American people desire to invest alongside Ukraine in a free, sovereign and secure Ukraine.”
A senior Ukrainian official told AP that the U.S. would not directly own Ukraine’s mineral and other resources. Instead, the co-owned fund would receive 50% of the revenue from natural resource deposits once they are developed, which could be a vehicle for the U.S. to recoup some of the costs of supporting Kyiv throughout the war.
Starmer pays a visit
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer is scheduled to meet with Mr. Trump in the Oval Office on Thursday. He will gather with European leaders in London on Sunday to discuss security issues, including a proposal to deploy European troops to Ukraine after a ceasefire is reached. Russia has roundly rejected any suggestion that European troops could be deployed to Ukraine as part of a peace deal, although Mr. Trump has said the Kremlin could change its mind.
U.S. and Russian diplomats are scheduled to meet in Istanbul on Thursday to discuss improved bilateral relations. This is part of Mr. Trump’s unilateral diplomatic outreach to the Kremlin, which has deeply unnerved Ukraine and leading U.S. allies.
Mr. Trump was still negotiating in public as Mr. Zelenskyy prepared for the fraught visit to Washington. He said Russian President Vladimir Putin also must make concessions as part of any peace agreement ending its war on Ukraine.
“Yeah. He will. He’s going to have to,” Mr. Trump said at the Cabinet meeting.
He declined to reveal those concessions and deferred to Vice President J.D. Vance, who traveled to Europe and met with Mr. Zelenskyy. Mr. Vance said the hard decisions would be made behind closed doors in the coming days.
“We’re not going to do the negotiation in public with the American people. [Mr. Trump is] going to do it in private with the president of Russia, president of Ukraine and other leaders, and I think that’s how it has to go,” Mr. Vance said.
When asked later about Russian concessions, Mr. Trump said Ukraine could forget about NATO membership, a long-held goal of the Zelenskyy government.
The president expressed confidence that he and the Ukrainian leader could reach a compromise and said the long-term presence of American commercial interests embedded in the Ukrainian economy would be one guarantee that Russia would not pursue its aggression.
“It’s now confirmed, and we’re going to be signing an agreement,” the president said. “We’ve been able to make a deal where we’re going to be able to get our money back.”
Comments from Mr. Zelenskyy and his aides have been far more measured. They described the accord as a preliminary “framework” agreement and said Kyiv must have concrete security guarantees and continued access to U.S. military aid as part of any mineral deal.
Mr. Zelenskyy said he would discuss with Mr. Trump whether the U.S. plans to halt military aid and, if so, whether Ukraine could purchase weapons directly from the U.S., AP reported.
Kyiv also rejects Mr. Trump’s characterization that Ukraine will be “paying back” the aid it has received through the economic development agreement.
“We are not debtors,” Mr. Zelenskyy said. “There is no $500 billion [payment] in the agreement … because that would be unfair.”
• David R. Sands contributed to this report.
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.