Ukraine and the US will not sign the subsoil agreement this week.
This was stated by Finance Minister Serhiy Marchenko.
According to him, the countries made progress on the agreement during todayʼs talks.
Last week, Trump reported that Ukraine and the United States would sign a minerals agreement on April 24, that is, today.
After that, at a briefing on April 22, Volodymyr Zelensky stated that lawyers were working on the subsoil agreement. At the time, he emphasized that nothing more was known about other steps regarding the extension or finalization of the agreement.
Ukraine and the United States signed a memorandum on April 17, which confirms the intention to finalize and conclude an agreement on subsoil. The text stated that the negotiating teams would report by April 26 in order to complete the discussions by that date and sign the agreement as soon as possible. What lies ahead is the finalization of the text of the agreement on subsoil and its signing, and then ratification by parliaments.
What is known about the US-Ukraine subsoil agreement?
The US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent brought a pilot draft of a minerals agreement to Ukraine on February 12. Washington hoped that Kyiv would sign it immediately. However, President Zelensky said that he had banned the signing of the agreement because it would not be able to protect Ukraine’s interests — there is no connection to investments, profits, and security guarantees. After that, it began to be finalized.
The final agreement was supposed to be signed on February 28, during Volodymyr Zelenskyʼs visit to the White House. However, then Donald Trump and the Ukrainian president had a falling out — the Ukrainian delegation left the White House early. The document was not signed. However, both sides stated that negotiations on the agreement were ongoing.
The United States is now proposing a new deal on Ukrainian minerals, as well as oil and gas, without offering security guarantees in return. The Financial Times, which has seen the draft agreement, writes that Washington is aggressively expanding its demands. In Kyiv, it believes that this could undermine Ukraine’s sovereignty, divert profits abroad and deepen the country’s dependence on the United States. However, Kyiv will ask to change the agreement, demanding in return increased American investment. The US President Donald Trump has already threatened Zelensky with “big problems” if he abandons the subsoil deal.
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