Ukraine offers access to minerals to US

 The Hill:

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is leveraging the country’s large deposits of rare earth materials and critical minerals to win the favor of President Trump ahead of high-stakes negotiations to end Russia’s war of aggression.

Trump said Wednesday that Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to begin negotiations immediately, with plans to meet in Saudi Arabia. Trump’s top officials are in Europe this week huddling with Ukrainian and European officials on plans to end the war.

Ukraine is offering itself as a reliable partner in the global competition for key mineral resources – if occupying Russian forces are ousted from Ukrainian territory where some of these resources are located.

“We have a lot of rare sources, rare materials, which is crucially important for weapon production. We explained to our colleagues as now, under Russian control, our eastern part, where there are a lot of these resources,” Lesia Zaburranna, a Ukrainian member of Parliament, told The Hill, following meetings in Washington D.C. last week.

“For us it’s very important to liberate [these territories] because in this case, these resources will be developed by Ukraine and the USA. But not Russia, China, Iran and North Korea.”

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was in Kyiv on Wednesday and said that a minerals deal with Washington would provide Ukraine with a post-war “security shield.”

“Security matters. Moscow and its allies cannot be allowed to gain control over Ukraine, and that means we must work together—across the free world,” Zelensky posted on X about his meeting with Bessent.

Trump said he wants Ukraine to provide about $500 billion worth of rare earth elements, suggesting it as repayment for U.S. military and economic aid provided to Kyiv since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in Feb. 2022.
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But negotiations between Zelensky and U.S. officials are off to a rocky start, Politico reported Saturday. Ukraine reportedly balked at a U.S. proposal calling for U.S. rights to half of Ukraine’s rare earth minerals in exchange for military support.
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Russia is unlikely to go along with the US military in Ukraine.  One of the reasons Russia invaded Ukraine was because it feared the US and Western European countries being on its doorstep in Ukraine. 

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Rapid warfare tech helps U.S. Army build on lessons learned in Ukraine's war with Russia

As the morning fog lifted over rolling, wooded hills in Bavaria, southeast Germany, a drone swept down to the grassy clearing and two U.S. infantrymen ran out of a nearby forest to change two long, black batteries.

Under the cover of trees nearby, another soldier was on a laptop monitoring the activity of that drone and several others, tracking an enemy vehicle several miles away.

Developed and tested using information from the real-life battlefield in Ukraine, the drone was one of several pieces of technology including light vehicles and updated communication devices that were being tested for the first time by the U.S. Army in Europe.
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