Ukraine gives away resources, but does not receive guarantees: how the world press reacts to the agreement with the United States
The signing of international agreements always causes a wide resonance, especially when it comes to strategically important natural resources. Ukraine and the United States of America are preparing to conclude a framework agreement, which provides for the joint extraction and export of Ukrainian minerals – oil, gas, uranium, coal and rare earth metals. Volodymyr Zelenskyi, who will come to Washington today, emphasized that the document does not contain security guarantees for Ukraine. Foreign media actively comment on this agreement, expressing both support and skepticism about its terms and consequences.
Salzburger Nachrichten – Austria. According to Salzburger Nachrichten, Ukraine cannot avoid signing the agreement on terms that are bad for itself:
“This is a cynical agreement. All the actions of Donald Trump are aimed at benefiting the United States or harming China, and the best is both. … For Ukraine, this agreement is a gesture of desperation. It simply has no choice. Without the support of the United States, Ukraine is doomed. The draft agreement does not have the security guarantees that Zelensky demanded, the agreement deprives Kyiv of funds for the reconstruction of the country in the future. The only thing there is a chance that the Americans “will not will jump off”, and even this is only hope”.
https://www.eurotopics.net/kurz/nbl
Ilta-Sanomat – Finland. Trump sees Ukraine exclusively as a debtor – the Helsinki-based Ilta-Sanomat states with regret:
“During these three years of war, the United States was the main donor to Ukraine. However, support among members of Congress began to weaken already under President Joe Biden. But at that time, no one insisted on returning the allocated funds.
In Trump’s eyes, Ukraine is not a defender of the freedoms of the Western world, but a debtor. Trump’s blackmail is reminiscent of a return to the days of colonialism, when the largest powers saw small countries only as a source of minerals. And it is not at all in Finland’s interest to return at this time!”.
https://www.eurotopics.net/kurz/nbm
Rzeczpospolita – Poland. The Warsaw Rzeczpospolita believes that this agreement is the best security guarantee currently possible:
“It is hard to imagine that in the event of a threat, the United States will abandon its investments there without a fight, which will cost many billions of American taxpayers’ dollars (because of the mineral deposits in Ukraine). Every future US president will protect these investments. Ukraine has no other security guarantees, and the door to NATO will probably be closed for many years to come.”
https://www.eurotopics.net/kurz/nbn
De Volkskrant – Netherlands. The writer and columnist of the Amsterdam newspaper De Volkskrant, Tommy Wieringa, reflects that the commodity agreement only confirms the madness of today’s powerful people:
“The difference between the America of the era of the Marshall Plan and the current America, which squeezes natural resources, in the best way. Currently, Ukraine is being blackmailed into a bad peace, and without minimal security guarantees.
In Riyadh, authoritarianism decides the fate of the free world. There is nothing positive in this corrupt assembly, only lust for profit and moral degradation. I wish there was a special town in hell where people of this type would languish in red-hot cauldrons for the rest of their days – and preferably on a slow fire, supported by their own reserves of gas and oil.”
https://www.eurotopics.net/kurz/nbp
