US President Donald Trump will host Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House and sign a deal granting Washington access to Ukraine’s rare minerals, week after dubbing his Ukrainian counterpart a “dictator”.
The deal would see the United States jointly develop Ukraine’s mineral wealth, with revenues going to a newly created fund that would be “joint for Ukraine and America”, a senior Ukrainian source told AFP.
According to an AP report, Zelenskyy’s delegation is expected to sign a landmark economic agreement with the US aimed at financing the reconstruction of war-damaged Ukraine, a deal that would closely tie the two countries together for years to come.
Trump changed years of American policy regarding Ukraine two weeks ago when he spoke to Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
ALSO READ: ‘Terrible job’: Donald Trump doubles down on Volodymyr Zelensky as tensions rise over Russia-Ukraine war
According to Reuters, the US president described his call with Putin as “lengthy and highly productive” and thanked Putin “for his time and effort,” emphasizing their shared desire to halt the fighting without saying a word that it was Russia that sent troops into Ukraine.
On Thursday, Russian and US diplomats met in Istanbul to discuss normalising the operation of their respective embassies after years expelling each others’ diplomats.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the talks followed an understanding reached during Trump’s call with Vladimir Putin and contact between senior Russian and US diplomats and other officials in Saudi Arabia.
Trump’s ‘dictator’ jibe at Zelensky
On February 20, Trump launched his biggest attack on Zelensky, saying,”A Dictator without Elections, Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left.
However, he downplayed the remark when asked by reporters at the White House. “Did I say that? I can’t believe I said that,” Trump responded on Friday when asked by journalists about his comment made this month in a post on his Truth Social platform.
Trump’s tone has softened in recent days after visits by French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
“I have a lot of respect for him,” Trump said of Zelensky on Thursday. “We’re going to get along really well.”
The dictator outburst was sparked in particular by Zelensky’s initial rejection of the deal to give Washington preferential access to Ukrainian natural resources, including oil, gas and rare earth metals.
