The US and Ukraine have signed an agreement to fund the war-torn country’s reconstruction, two months after an earlier deal was shelved when the nations’ leaders clashed at the White House.
The two countries have been discussing a deal that would give the US access to Ukraine’s critical minerals deposits for weeks.
US President Donald Trump had previously described that deal as a way for Ukraine to pay back the US for the military aid it has provided since Russia’s 2022 invasion.
It is not clear how closely this deal resembles the agreement Mr Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy were set to sign before the infamous Oval Office showdown in February.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump sit on chairs in a grand space and speak.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump spoke in the Vatican the weekend before Pope Francis’s funeral. (Reuters: Ukrainian Presidential Press Service)
The new deal will establish a jointly managed reconstruction fund, financed by new mineral, oil and gas projects in Ukraine.
Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said the agreement includes “no provisions regarding any Ukrainian debt obligations to the United States.” However, it provides an economic incentive for the US to continue defending Ukraine.
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Ms Svyrydenko, who signed the deal in Washington, said Ukraine would retain full ownership and control of its resources. “It is the Ukrainian state that determines what and where to extract,” she wrote on X.
Ms Svyrydenko said the deal “allows both countries to expand their economic potential through equal cooperation and investment.”
Since Russia’s invasion, the US has provided tens of billions of dollars in aid. However, the relationship has been strained since the inauguration of Mr Trump, who promised to end the war in a day during the election campaign.
Mr Trump has described Mr Zelenskyy as a “dictator” and a “salesman” and criticised him for not agreeing to cede territory to Russia. After February’s Oval Office clash, the US temporarily suspended security assistance and intelligence sharing.
In March, Mr Trump spoke to Russian President Vladimir Putin by phone, but Mr Putin rejected his proposal for a 30-day ceasefire, which Mr Zelenskyy had accepted.
In a statement after the deal was signed on Wednesday, local time, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said it was a sign of the Trump administration’s commitment to a “peace process centred on a free, sovereign, and prosperous Ukraine over the long term”.
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“And to be clear, no state or person who financed or supplied the Russian war machine will be allowed to benefit from the reconstruction of Ukraine,” he said.
The US Treasury said the reconstruction fund would recognise “the significant financial and material support that the people of the US have provided to the defence of Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion”.
Earlier Wednesday, Mr Bessent said the US was ready to sign the deal, but Ukraine wanted to make some last-minute changes. “We’re sure that they will reconsider that,” he said.
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