Ukraine and the United States have made progress in an agreement on critical minerals, but “certainly not” will be finalized this week, the Ukrainian Finance Minister Seri Marchenko told Reuters, saying that there were still questions to be resolved.
Marchenko and other Ukrainian authorities met on Wednesday with the US Treasury Secretary Scott Beesent to discuss the agreement and the ongoing issues on the western Russian active ingredients from the Ukrainian invasion of Russia in February 2022.
The two countries signed a memorandum a week ago as a first step to close an agreement on the expansion of economic cooperation, also through the development of mining resources in Ukraine, which was difficult.
The President of the United States Donald Trump has promoted the agreement since the beginning of his second term in January. In February, both sides were ready to sign a natural resources agreement, but it was postponed – and since then she was revised – after an Oval Hall meeting between Trump and the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy became a discussion.
Last week, Trump said he expected the agreement that the agreement was signed on Thursday, but Marchenko said that a signature this week would not be possible, although he and the upper Ukrainian employees, including Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal, are in Washington for international monitoring and world bank meetings.
“There have been progress and now our teams are working closely,” Shmyhal said after an event organized by the Ukrainian Embassy. “There are still some questions that we are discussing,” he said, without providing details.
When asked if an agreement could be signed this week, Marchenko said: “No, this week definitely not. Don’t surely not.”
He said the conversations continued despite the attacks of Russia in Kiev at night, saying that the two questions were not related.
The Treasury published the meeting with the Ukrainian authorities on Thursday and underlined the need to sign the economic partnership between the two countries as soon as possible.
Trump is pressing on a pact that gives the United States privileged access to the natural resources and critical minerals of Ukraine, which considers a payment for military aid provided by the former president Joe Biden.
Washington said he will move away from the efforts to mediate a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine unless there are clear signs of progress.
Marchenko has also said that Beesent wants the problem of frozen Russian activities – which, according to Kiev, should be delivered to Ukraine to pay damage to war and losses – to be part of wider discussions.
Source: Terra
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