London: Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has said he was ready to sign the aborted mineral deal with the US after British Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a “Coalition of the Willing” to back him at a summit of European leaders.
“If we agreed to sign the minerals deal, we’re ready to sign it”, he said on Sunday after the summit. “The agreement that’s on the table will be signed if the parties are ready”, he told reporters.
But there was no clarity about the US willingness to continue with the agreement that had been crafted by the two sides and ready for signing.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that the agreement would be “rendered moot if he wants the fighting to continue”.
Zelensky has said he wants an end to Russia’s aggression and security from the US first.
But Bessent said that a peace deal was necessary for the mineral agreement to work.
France and Britain, meanwhile, tried to give impetus to the peace efforts that US President Donald Trump has been spearheading while facing Zelensky’s scepticism.
Starmer said that he and France’s President Emmanuel Macron will come up with a pace plan with Zelensky and take it up with Trump.
“We’ve now agreed that the United Kingdom, along with France and possibly one or two others, will work with Ukraine on a plan to stop the fighting, and then we’ll discuss that plan with the United States”, he told the BBC.
In a preview of the plan, Macron said it could start with a one-month ceasefire that would be a prelude to a complete peace deal.
In an interview with the newspaper Le Figaro, he said that initially the ceasefire would cover air, sea, and the energy infrastructure, which are easy to monitor, and not ground fighting that would be difficult to monitor.
He said, “The question is how we use this time to try to secure an achievable ceasefire, with negotiations that will last several weeks and then a deployment of troops once peace is signed”.
Britain and France have offered to post troops in Ukraine in a peacekeeping operation to ensure the fighting does not resume.
Starmer said, “We agree with Trump on the urgent need for a durable peace. Now we need to deliver together,” but he said, “Europe must do the heavy lifting”.
Eighteen leaders from Europe and Canada participated in the summit, which, as Starmer said. came “at a crossroads in history”.
At the summit, the leaders stepped up to take more responsibility for Europe’s security amid doubts about the extent of continued support from the US under Trump.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said Europe showed a readiness for “stepping up” support to help Ukraine to continue facing Russia.
In his interview, Macron said European countries should boost their defence spending to between 3 and 3.5 per cent of their gross domestic product, above the NATO target of 2 per cent.
Trump has demanded that the Europeans increase their defence spending.
Macron pointed out that Russia was spending 10 per cent of its GDP on defence.
On Friday, Zelensky who had come to sign the minerals agreement got into a vehement altercation with Trump and Vice President JD Vance, who accused him of not being sufficiently grateful to the US and disrespectful to the president.
When Zelensky tried to raise his doubts about the peace deal with Moscow that Trump was negotiating without Ukraine and said that Russia’s President could not be trusted, the meeting at the Oval Office in front of live cameras ended without signing the agreement. Trump later told reporters that Zelensky was not interested in peace.
Under the mineral agreement, an investment fund to be jointly operated by the US and Ukraine would be set up, with 50 per cent of future income from Ukraine’s state-owned mineral resources, oil, and gas going into it. Some of the money from the fund would be invested in Ukraine.
Some media reports said that Trump wanted Ukraine to pledge to the US $500 billion in million mineral wealth but the demand was dropped.
Zelensky’s welcome in Britain was in stark contrast to the hostility he faced in Washington. He was warmly received by Starmer and later met with King Charles.
At the summit, the European leaders rallied around him making their support clear.
(IANS)
