Há 17 horas
quinta-feira, 1 de maio de 2025
quarta-feira, 30 de abril de 2025
US and Ukraine sign minerals deal that solidifies investment in Kyiv’s defense against Russia
US and
Ukraine sign minerals deal that solidifies investment in Kyiv’s defense against
Russia
Move seals a
deal to create a fund the Trump administration says will begin to repay roughly
$175bn provided to Ukraine
Andrew Roth
in Washington
Thu 1 May
2025 05.35 BST
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/30/us-ukraine-minerals-deal-russia
The US and
Kyiv have signed an agreement to share profits and royalties from the future
sale of Ukrainian minerals and rare earths, sealing a deal that Donald Trump
has said will provide an economic incentive for the US to continue to invest in
Ukraine’s defense and its reconstruction after he brokers a peace deal with
Russia.
The minerals
deal, which has been the subject of tense negotiations for months and nearly
fell through hours before it was signed, will establish a US-Ukraine
Reconstruction Investment Fund that the Trump administration has said will
begin to repay an estimated $175bn in aid provided to Ukraine since the
beginning of the war.
“This
agreement signals clearly to Russia that the Trump administration is committed
to a peace process centered on a free, sovereign, and prosperous Ukraine over
the long term,” said Scott Bessent, the US treasury secretary, in a statement.
“President
Trump envisioned this partnership between the American people and the Ukrainian
people to show both sides’ commitment to lasting peace and prosperity in
Ukraine. 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.”
Ukraine’s
first deputy prime minister, Yulia Svyrydenko, confirmed in a social media post
that she had signed the agreement on Wednesday. “Together with the United
States, we are creating the fund that will attract global investment into our
country,” she wrote. The deal still needs to be approved by Ukraine’s
parliament.
Ukrainian
officials have divulged details of the agreement which they portrayed as
equitable and allowing Ukraine to maintain control over its natural resources.
The
Ukrainian prime minister, Denys Shmyhal, said that the fund would be split
50-50 with between the US and Ukraine and give each side equal voting rights.
Ukraine
would retain “full control over its mineral resources, infrastructure and
natural resources,” he said, and would relate only to new investments, meaning
that the deal would not provide for any debt obligations against Ukraine, a key
concern for Kyiv. The deal would ensure revenue by establishing contracts on a
“take-or-pay” basis, Shmyhal added.
Shmyhal on
Wednesday described the deal as “truly a good, equal and beneficial
international agreement on joint investments in the development and recovery of
Ukraine”.
Critics of
the deal had said the White House is seeking to take advantage of Ukraine by
linking future aid to the embattled nation to a giveaway of the revenues from
its resources. The final terms were far less onerous for Ukraine than those
proposed initially by Bessent in February, which included a clause that the US
would control 100% of the revenues from the fund.
On Wednesday
Trump said a US presence on the ground would benefit Ukraine. “The American
presence will, I think, keep a lot of bad actors out of the country or
certainly out of the area where we’re doing the digging,” he said at a cabinet
meeting.
Speaking at
a town hall with NewsNation after the deal had been signed, Trump said he told
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy during a recent meeting at the Vatican
that signing the deal would be a “very good thing” because “Russia is much
bigger and much stronger”.
Asked
whether the minerals deal was going to “inhibit” Russian president Vladimir
Putin, Trump said “well, it could.”
UK foreign
secretary David Lammy welcomed the agreement in a post on X, adding that “the
UK’s support for Ukraine remains steadfast”.
It was
unclear up until the last moment whether the US and Ukraine would manage to
sign the deal, with Washington reportedly pressuring Ukraine to sign additional
agreements, including on the structure of the investment fund, or to “go back
home”. That followed months of strained negotiations during which the US
regularly delivered last-minute ultimatums while cutting off aid and other
support for Ukraine in its defence against Russia.
Ukraine’s
prime minister earlier had said he expected the country to sign the minerals
deal with the US in “the next 24 hours” but reports emerged that Washington was
insisting Kyiv sign three deals in total.
The
Financial Times said Bessent’s team had told Svyrydenko, who was reportedly en
route to Washington DC, to “be ready to sign all agreements, or go back home”.
Bessent
later said the US was ready to sign though Ukraine had made some last-minute
changes.
Reuters
reported that Ukraine believed the two supplementary agreements – reportedly on
an investment fund and a technical document – required more work.
The idea
behind the deal was originally proposed by Ukraine, looking for ways to offer
economic opportunities that might entice Trump to back the country. But Kyiv
was blindsided in January when Trump’s team delivered a document that would
essentially involve handing over the country’s mineral wealth with little by
way of return.
Since then,
there have been various attempts to revise and revisit the terms of the deal,
as well as a planned signing ceremony that was aborted after a disastrous
meeting between Trump and Zelenskyy at the White House in February.
Earlier this
month, it was revealed that the Ukrainian justice ministry had hired US law
firm Hogan Lovells to advise on the negotiations over the deal, according to
filings with the US Foreign Agents Registration Act registry.
In a post on
Facebook, Ukraine’s first deputy prime minister Yulia Svyrydenko gave further
details of the fund, which she said would “attract global investment”.
She
confirmed that Ukraine would retain full ownership of resources “on our
territory and in territorial waters belong to Ukraine”. “It is the Ukrainian
state that determines where and what to extract,” she said.
There would
be no changes to ownership of state-owned companies, she said, “they will
continue to belong to Ukraine”. That included companies such as Ukrnafta,
Ukraine’s largest oil producer, and nuclear energy producer Energoatom.
Income would
come from new licences for critical materials and oil and gas projects, not
from projects which had already begun, she said.
Income and
contributions to the fund would not be taxed in the US or Ukraine, she said,
“to make investments yield the greatest results” and technology transfer and
development were a “key” part of the agreement.
Washington
would contribute to the fund, she said. “In addition to direct financial
contributions, it may also provide new assistance – for example air defense
systems for Ukraine,” she said. Washington did not directly address that
suggestion.
Ukraine
holds some 5% of the world’s mineral resources and rare earths, according to
various estimates. But work has not yet started on tapping many of the
resources and many sites are in territory now controlled by Russian forces.
Razom for
Ukraine, a US nonprofit that provides medical and humanitarian aid to Ukraine
and advocates for US assistance, welcomed the deal, and encouraged the Trump
administration to increase pressure on Vladimir Putin to end the invasion.
“We
encourage the Trump administration to build on the momentum of this economic
agreement by forcing Putin to the table through sanctions, seizing Russia’s
state assets to aid Ukraine, and giving Ukraine the tools it needs to defend
itself,” Mykola Murskyj, director of advocacy for Razom, said in a statement.
Trump warns ‘nothing will stop me’ at rally to celebrate 100 days in office
11.01 BST
Trump
warns ‘nothing will stop me’ at rally to celebrate 100 days in office
Hello and
welcome to the US politics live blog. I’m Tom Ambrose and will be bringing you
the latest news lines over the next few hours.
Let’s start
with the president’s Michigan rally last night. Donald Trump has celebrated his
100th day in office with a campaign-style rally in Michigan and an attack on
“communist radical left judges” for trying to seize his power, warning:
“Nothing will stop me.”
The
president also served up the chilling spectacle of a video of Venezuelan
immigrants sent from the US to a notorious prison in El Salvador, accompanied
by Hollywood-style music and roars of approval from the crowd.
Trump’s
choice of Michigan was a recognition not only of how the battleground state
helped propel him to victory over Vice-President Kamala Harris in last
November’s election, but its status as a potential beneficiary of a tariffs
policy which, he claims, will revive US manufacturing.
But the
cavernous sports and expo centre in the city of Warren, near Detroit, was only
half full for the rally, and a steady stream of people left before the end of
his disjointed and meandering 89-minute address.
“We’re here
tonight in the heartland of our nation to celebrate the most successful first
100 days of any administration in the history of our country!” Trump declared.
“In 100 days, we have delivered the most profound change in Washington in
nearly 100 years.”
The 45th and
47th president falsely accused the previous administration of engineering
massive border invasion and allowing gangs, cartels and terrorists to
infiltrate communities. “Democrats have vowed mass invasion and mass
migration,” he said. “We are delivering mass deportation.”
Ken Martin,
chair of the Democratic National Committee, said: “Trump’s pathetic display
tonight will do nothing to help the families he started screwing over 100 days
ago.
“Michiganders
and the rest of the country see right through Trump, and as a result, he has
the lowest 100-day approval rating in generations. If he’s not already
terrified of what the ballot box will bring between now and the midterm
elections, he should be.”
As Trump
defended his broadly unpopular handling of the economy, he criticized Fed chair
Jerome Powell, saying: “I have a Fed person who’s not really doing a good job,
but I won’t say that.” The businessman president who used bankruptcy law to
rescue his failed enterprises six times added: “I know much more about interest
rates than he does”.
Trump
mistakenly attacked the Michigan representative John James, calling the
Republican he had endorsed “a lunatic” for trying to impeach him. That was
someone else.
Trump
supporters praised by the president at a rally included the former member of a
violent cult who founded Blacks for Trump, and a retired autoworker who once
told people to read David Duke’s “honest and fair” book about race.
The US
Department of Justice has begun the first criminal prosecutions of immigrants
for entering a newly declared military buffer zone created along the border
with Mexico, according to court filings.
Trump
called Amazon executive chair Jeff Bezos on Tuesday morning to complain about a
report that the company planned to display prices that show the impact of
tariffs. Trump told reporters later that Bezos “was very nice, he was terrific”
during their call, and “he solved the problem very quickly”.
The uniting theme of Trump’s presidency? Ineptitude
The
uniting theme of Trump’s presidency? Ineptitude
Robert Reich
From
deportations to human rights to the economy, the president’s actions have
resulted in mayhem. Here’s a sampling
Tue 29 Apr
2025 17.00 BST
Some
Democrats fear they’re playing into Donald Trump’s hands by fighting his mass
deportations rather than focusing on his failures on bread-and-butter issues
like the cost of living.
But it’s not
either-or. The theme that unites Trump’s inept handling of deportations, his
trampling on human and civil rights, his rejection of the rule of law, his
dictatorial centralization of power, and his utterly inept handling of the
economy is the ineptness itself.
In his first
term, not only did his advisers and cabinet officials put guardrails around his
crazier tendencies, but they also provided his first administration a degree of
stability and focus. Now, it’s mayhem.
A sampling
from recent weeks:
1. The Pete
Hegseth disaster. The
defense secretary didn’t just mistakenly share the military’s plans with the
editor of the Atlantic; we now know he shared them with a second Signal group,
including his wife, brother and personal lawyer.
He’s a
walking disaster. John Ullyot, who resigned last week as Pentagon spokesperson,
penned an op-ed in Politico that began: “It’s been a month of total chaos at
the Pentagon.” Last Friday, Hegseth fired three of his senior staffers. His
chief of staff is leaving. As Ullyot wrote, it’s “very likely” that “even
bigger bombshell stories” will come soon. The defense department “is in
disarray under Hegseth’s leadership”.
It’s not
just the defense department. Much of the federal government is in disarray.
2. The
Harvard debacle. A Trump
official is now claiming that a letter full of demands about university policy
sent to Harvard on 11 April was “unauthorized”. What does this even mean?
As Harvard
pointed out, the letter “was signed by three federal officials, placed on
official letterhead, was sent from the email inbox of a senior federal official
and was sent on April 11 as promised. Recipients of such correspondence from
the US government – even when it contains sweeping demands that are astonishing
in their overreach – do not question its authenticity or seriousness.”
Even though
it was “unauthorized”, the Trump regime is standing by the letter, which has
now prompted Harvard to sue.
3. The
tariff travesty. No
sooner had Trump imposed “retaliatory” tariffs on almost all of the US’s
trading partners – based on a formula that has made no sense to anyone – than
the US stock and bond markets began crashing.
To stop the
selloff, Trump declared a 90-day pause on the retaliatory tariffs but raised
his tariffs on China to 145% – causing markets to plummet once again.
Presumably
to stem the impending economic crisis, he declared an exemption to the China
tariffs for smartphones and computer equipment. By doing so, Trump essentially
admitted what he had before denied: that importers and consumers bear the cost
of tariffs.
Now, Trump
is saying that even his China tariffs aren’t really real. Following warnings
from Walmart, Target and Home Depot that the tariffs would spike prices, Trump
termed the tariffs he imposed on China “very high” and promised they “will come
down substantially. But it won’t be zero.”
Markets
soared on the news. But where in the world are we heading?
4. The
attack on the Fed chair fiasco. When Trump renewed his attacks on Jerome H Powell, the chair of the
Federal Reserve – calling him “a major loser” and demanding that the Fed cut
interest rates – Trump unnerved already anxious investors who understand the
importance of the Fed’s independence and feared that a politicized Fed wouldn’t
be able to credibly fight inflation.
Then, in
another about-face, Trump said on Wednesday he had “no intention” of firing
Powell, which also helped lift markets.
An economy
needs predictability. Investors won’t invest, consumers won’t buy, and
producers won’t produce if everything continues to change. But Trump doesn’t
think ahead. He responds only to immediate threats and problems.
Who’s
profiting from all this tumult? Anyone with inside knowledge of what Trump is
about to do: most likely, Trump and his family.
5. The
Kilmar Ábrego García calamity. After the Trump regime admitted an “administrative error” in sending
Ábrego García to a brutal Salvadoran torture prison, in violation of a federal
court order, Trump then virtually ignored a 9-0 supreme court order to
facilitate his return.
To the
contrary, with cameras rolling in the Oval Office, Trump embraced Nayib Bukele
– who governs El Salvador in a permanent state of emergency and has himself
imprisoned 83,000 people in brutal dungeons, mostly without due process. Trump
then speculated about using Bukele’s prisons for “homegrown” (ie,
American-born) criminals or dissidents.
Meanwhile,
after the Trump regime deported another group of immigrants to the Salvadoran
prison under a rarely invoked 18th-century wartime law, the supreme court
blocked it from deporting any more people under the measure.
6. Ice’s
blunderbuss. Further
illustrating the chaos of the Trump regime, immigration officials have been
detaining US citizens. One American was held by Immigration and Customs
Enforcement (Ice) in Arizona for 10 days until his relatives produced papers
proving his citizenship, because, according to his girlfriend’s aunt, Ice
didn’t believe he was American.
Last week,
the Trump regime abruptly took action to restore the legal status of thousands
of international students who had been told in recent weeks that their right to
study in the United States had been rescinded, but officials reserved the right
to terminate their legal status at any time. What?
Freedom
depends on the rule of law. The rule of law depends on predictability. Just
like Trump’s wildly inconsistent economic policies, his policies on immigration
are threatening everyone.
7. Musk’s
‘Doge’ disaster. Musk’s
claims of government savings have been shown to be ludicrously exaggerated.
Remember the
claim that taxpayers funded $50m in condoms in Gaza? This was supposed to be
the first big “gotcha” from the so-called “department of government efficiency”
(Doge), but as we know now, it was a lie. The US government buys condoms for
about 5 cents apiece, which means $50m would buy 1bn condoms or roughly 467 for
every resident of Gaza. Besides, according to a federal 2024 report, the US
Agency for International Development (USAID) didn’t provide or fund any condoms
in the entire Middle East in the 2021, 2022 or 2023 fiscal years.
Then there
have been the frantic callbacks of fired federal workers, such as up to 350
employees at the National Nuclear Security Administration who work on sensitive
jobs such as reassembling warheads. Four days after Doge fired them, the
agency’s acting director rescinded the firings and asked them back. Similar
callbacks have occurred throughout the government.
Trump and
Musk are threatening the safety and security of Americans – for almost no real
savings.
8. Measles
mayhem. As measles
breaks out across the country, sickening hundreds and killing at least two
children so far, Trump’s secretary for health and human services, Robert F
Kennedy Jr, continues to claim that the measles vaccine “causes deaths every
year … and all the illnesses that measles itself causes, encephalitis and
blindness, et cetera”.
In fact, the
measles vaccine is safe, and its risks are lower than the risks of
complications from measles. Most people who get the measles vaccine have no
serious problems from it, the CDC says. There have been no documented deaths
from the vaccine in healthy, non-immunocompromised people, according to the
Infectious Diseases Society of America.
Kennedy also
says: “We’re always going to have measles, no matter what happens, as the
[measles] vaccine wanes very quickly.” In fact, the measles vaccine is highly
protective and lasts a lifetime for most people. Two doses of the vaccine are
97% effective against the virus, according to the CDC and medical experts
worldwide. The US saw 3m to 4m cases a year before the vaccine. Today it’s
typically fewer than 200.
9. Student
debt snafu. After a
five-year pause on penalizing borrowers for not making student loan payments,
the Trump regime is about to require households to resume payments. This could
cause credit scores to plunge and slow the economy.
Many of the
households required to resume paying on their student loans are also struggling
with credit card debt at near-record interest rates and high-rate mortgages
they thought they would be able to refinance at a lower rate but haven’t.
Instead of increasing education department staffing to handle a work surge and
clarifying the often shifting rules of its many repayment programs, the Trump
regime has done the opposite and cut staff.
10. Who’s in
charge? In the span of a
single week, the IRS had three different leaders. Three days after Gary Shapley
was named acting commissioner, it was announced that the deputy treasury
secretary, Michael Faulkender, would replace Shapley. That was the same day,
not incidentally, that the IRS cut access to the agency for Doge’s top
representative.
What
happened? The treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, told Trump that Musk had
evaded him to install Shapley.
Meanwhile,
the Trump regime is cutting the IRS in half – starting with 6,700 layoffs and
gutting the division that audits people with excessive wealth. These are the
people meant to keep billionaires accountable. Without them, the federal
government will not take in billions of dollars owed.
At the same
time, the trade adviser Peter Navarro has entered into a public spat with Musk,
accusing him of not being a “car manufacturer” but a “car assembler” because
Tesla relies on parts from around the world. This prompted Musk to call Navarro
a “moron” and “dumber than a sack of bricks” in a post on X, later posting that
he wanted to “apologize to bricks”.
The state
department has been torn apart by the firing of Peter Marocco, the official who
was dismantling USAID, by Marco Rubio, the secretary of state. Career officials
charged that Marocco, a Maga loyalist, was destroying the agency; Trump’s Maga
followers view Marocco’s firing as a sign that Rubio is part of the
establishment they want to destroy.
Worse yet,
Trump has fired more than a half-dozen national security officials after
meeting with the far-right agitator Lara Loomer, who was granted access to the
Oval Office and gave Trump a list of officials she deemed disloyal.
Bottom line:
no one is in charge. Trump is holding court but has the attention span of a
fruit fly. This is causing chaos across the federal government, as rival
sycophants compete for his limited attention.
Incompetence
is everywhere. The regime can’t keep military secrets. It can’t maintain
financial stability. It can’t protect children from measles. It cannot protect
America.
While we
need to continue to resist Trump’s authoritarianism, we also need to highlight
his utter inability to govern America.
Robert
Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus
at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist. His
newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com
Subscrever:
Mensagens (Atom)
