Zelenskyy shares his vision of Trump's arms-for-minerals deal

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy noted that Ukraine is ready to discuss various options for a deal with the US on access to the extraction of valuable natural resources on its territory, which Donald Trump is interested in. The key principle is that it should be a mutually beneficial format.

Zelenskyy was asked in an interview with The Guardian to elaborate on how he sees a possible deal, whether it is about preferential conditions for American companies entering the country for extraction or something else. 

"Today, we are very flexible with our partners in this regard. I believe it should be mutually beneficial. What is happening now is unfavourable for us, that Putin is seizing our territories and simply receiving valuable minerals for free," Zelenskyy said.

The President of Ukraine also noted that many of these territories and the Black Sea shelf have already been occupied.  He also said that this is the "concrete money" that Ukraine can offer to its allies who help it defend itself. 

"We can give our partners, primarily American businesses, the opportunity to invest. We can extract, develop and process together. These are jobs and income for American companies, for Americans, Ukrainians, and Europeans. We are very open to this. But we need to talk about it in detail," Ukrainian president added. 

The President added that we are talking about "big volumes" of resources that can potentially be extracted. 

"As I said about uranium or titanium, we have the largest amount of resources, at least in Europe… I think it is very important to protect them. So that it doesn't go to the Russians or others whom the Russians can give it to, these are Iran and North Korea, whom they can give it to for something – for debts, for some kind of support. And China… I don't think it's in the interests of the United States. The US interests are for it to be fair, controlled by Ukraine, and for the Western world, normal civilised partners, to have access," he concluded.

US President Donald Trump said that Ukraine had "essentially agreed" to provide the US with access to the mineral extraction on its territory worth about US$500 billion in exchange for aid.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent may visit Ukraine for preliminary talks on a deal in which the United States would gain access to Kyiv's rare earth resources in exchange for military aid.