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Published : 05 Mar 2025, 09:03 AM
US President Donald Trump's administration and Ukraine plan to sign a minerals deal that fell through after a disastrous Oval Office meeting Friday in which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was dismissed from the building, four people familiar with the situation said on Tuesday.
Trump had told his advisers that he wanted to announce the agreement in his address to Congress on Tuesday evening, three of the sources said, cautioning that the deal had yet to be signed and the situation could change.
However, when asked on Tuesday about the minerals deal, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News, "There is no signing planned," according to a post on X by a Fox reporter.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
Ukraine’s presidential administration in Kyiv and the Ukrainian embassy in Washington did not respond to requests for comment.
The deal was put on hold on Friday after a contentious Oval Office meeting between Trump and Zelensky that resulted in the Ukrainian leader's swift departure from the White House. Zelensky had travelled to Washington to sign the deal.
In that meeting, Trump and Vice President JD Vance berated Zelensky, telling him he should thank the US for its support rather than asking for additional aid in front of the US media.
"You're gambling with World War Three," Trump said.
US officials have in recent days spoken to officials in Kyiv about signing the minerals deal despite Friday's blow-up, and urged Zelensky's advisers to convince the Ukrainian president to apologise openly to Trump, according to one of the people familiar with the matter.
On Tuesday, Zelensky posted on X that Ukraine was ready to sign the deal and called the Oval Office meeting "regrettable."
“Our meeting in Washington, at the White House on Friday, did not go the way it was supposed to be,” Zelensky said in his post. "Ukraine is ready to come to the negotiating table as soon as possible to bring lasting peace closer."
It was unclear if the deal has changed. The deal that was to be signed last week included no explicit security guarantees for Ukraine but gave the US access to revenues from Ukraine's natural resources. It also envisaged the Ukrainian government contributing 50% of future monetisation of any state-owned natural resources to a US-Ukraine managed reconstruction investment fund.
On Monday, Trump signaled that his administration remained open to signing the deal, telling reporters in a gaggle that Ukraine "should be more appreciative."
"This country has stuck with them through thick and thin," Trump said. "We've given them much more than Europe, and Europe should have given more than us."
France, Britain and possibly other European countries have offered to send peacekeeping troops to Ukraine in the event of a ceasefire but would want support from the US or a "backstop." Moscow has rejected proposals for peacekeeping troops.
Daniel Fried, a former senior White House official and ambassador to Poland, said the path to getting the minerals deal done has been messy, but it would deliver two solid wins for Trump - Zelensky's statement of regret and the agreement of Britain and France to provide security and boots on the ground.
"Trump can and should take the win. He'd be able to say that he ... got the Europeans to stand up in front of an issue of European security, which they've never done before," said Fried, now a fellow at the Atlantic Council.
