President Volodymyr Zelenskyy does not intend to recognize Ukraine's USD 500 billion debt to the US, which US President Donald Trump insists on, and which is stipulated in one of the draft US-Ukraine minerals agreements.
Zelenskyy stated this at a press conference, Ukrainian News Agency reports.
According to him, the first version of the US agreement on Ukrainian rare earth minerals provided that Ukraine must give up 50% of the minerals listed in the document, without any security guarantees for Ukraine, which he rejected.
"The second format of the agreement - there was already USD 500 billion. Then it became clear all the messages before that, which came from the US, that we are talking about debt, that Ukraine should recognize debt in this way..." he said.
Zelenskyy added that according to his data, Ukraine received USD 100 billion in aid from the US.
"I know that we had 100 and that's a fact. I'm not going to recognize 500, no matter what anyone says, with all due respect to our partners," he stressed.
Zelenskyy added that he is also not ready to fix Ukraine's debt of USD 100 billion.
"To be honest, I'm not ready to fix even USD 100 billion. I'll explain why. Because we shouldn't recognize grants as debts. Like it or not. I negotiated with Biden and negotiated with the US Congress... there was support for grants. A grant is not a debt... That is, the question is not in the number, the question is that we don't recognize that it is a debt," he stressed.
Zelenskyy noted that if today the condition for aid from the US is the return of money with profit for the US, then this is a new agreement and he is ready for this dialogue with Trump.
At the same time, he emphasized that he would not sign something that would later be paid by 10 generations of Ukrainians.
As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, the head of the President's Office, Andrii Yermak, said regarding the agreement with the US on Ukrainian minerals that a normal working process is underway, it could last months.
On February 19, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, regarding the draft agreement on Ukrainian rare earth minerals, which was transferred to Ukraine by the US and which he refused to sign, noted that the document was clear only in that Ukraine must give 50% of what is listed in the document. Zelenskyy also stated that the agreement on Ukrainian rare earth minerals should contain security guarantees from the US.
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