The United States and Ukraine signed this vast economic agreement on Wednesday, April 30, April 30, April 30, April 30, implementing an investment fund in the reconstruction of this country ravaged by the war and giving the Trump administration access to Ukrainian natural resources. It does not seem to include US security guarantees against Russia, which is requested by Ukraine.
The United States and Ukraine signed this vast partnership in Washington this Wednesday, April 30, April 30, April 30, setting up an investment fund for the reconstruction of this country ravaged by the war and giving the Americans access to its natural resources.
“With the United States, we create this fund which will attract global investments in our country,” said the Ukrainian Minister of the Economy, Ioulia Svyrydenko, who made the trip to Washington to sign the document.
An agreement on minerals
The agreement with Washington will finance “mineral, petroleum and gas extraction projects,” said Ukrainian Minister on Facebook. But Ukraine “retains full ownership and control of these resources” including the basement, and it will be “the Ukrainian state that determines where and what to extract,” she said.
The quantity of mining riches contained in the Ukrainian soil remains unclear, most of these resources being unexploited, difficult to extract or de facto under Russian control, because they are in territories occupied by the Russian army.
Donald Trump “wants the two parties to sit at the table, now, showing that the United States has an economic interest in Ukraine,” said US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Fox News.
“It is a signal for Russian leaders. It is also a signal for the American people that we have a chance to participate, to obtain (…) compensation” for the funding and weapons provided to Ukraine, he added.
The United States provided, under the previous government of Joe Biden, tens of billions of dollars in assistance to Ukraine. However, the agreement does not recognize as a debt vis-à-vis the United States this military and financial aid.
What security guarantees?
According to the Washington Post, which was able to consult the agreement, the document does not mention the Zaporijia nuclear power plant. In March, during a call with his Ukrainia counterpart, Donald Trump spoke to Volodymyr Zelensky that the United States could take “possession” from Ukrainian nuclear and electric power plants.
“The American property of these power stations would be the best protection for this infrastructure and support for Ukrainian energy infrastructure,” said the American presidency.
The agreement does not seem to include US security guarantees against Russia, which was requested by Ukraine, a point on which Volodymyr Zelensky insisted. The president demanded guarantees to dissuade Russia from any new invasion after a possible agreement to cease hostilities.
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For his part, Donald Trump had declared in February, in the midst of negotiations around the agreement, that it was to the Europeans, not in the United States, to provide security guarantees to Ukraine as part of a settlement of the conflict with Russia.
“I will not provide security guarantees beyond many,” the American president said at a meeting of his cabinet in the White House. “We are going to ask Europe to do it because, you know, Europe is their immediate neighbor, but we will make sure that everything is going well,” he said in front of the cameras.
What military aid?
The text announced on Wednesday sets up an “investment fund to invest in the reconstruction” of Ukraine, which will be funded and managed equally by Ukrainians and American. According to Ukrainian Minister Ioulia Svyrydenko, “the United States will contribute to the fund. In addition to direct financial contributions, they can also provide new assistance, for example air defense systems for Ukraine.” No specific help has since been announced.
The American military aid that Ukraine is still perceived still comes from the assistance granted under Joe Biden, according to statements by Volodymyr Zelensky last week.
In a statement, the American Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, said on Wednesday that “this agreement clearly reports to Russia that the Trump administration is long -term in favor of a peace process centered on a free, sovereign and prosperous Ukraine.” The document must still be ratified by the Ukrainian parliament after its signature.
While this agreement was followed this Thursday, May 1, by a deadly Russian strike in the southern city of Odessa, the head of the Ukrainian presidential administration, Andriï Iermark, called on Telegram to push with the United States “for a full cease-fire”.
Russian President Vladimir Putin “will constantly have the desire to kill, until the end of his days, but diplomacy coupled with energetic economic means of influence will contrast Russia to arrest war,” wrote Andriï Iermark.
