President Trump Says US Will Soon Sign A Mineral Deal With Ukraine

President Trump. (Twitter/@WhiteHouse)

JAKARTA - President Donald Trump said on Thursday the United States would soon sign a mineral deal and natural resources with Ukraine, believing its efforts to reach a peace agreement for the country went "good enough" after talks this week with leaders of Russia and Ukraine.

That was conveyed by President Trump at an event at the White House after signing an order to increase production of critical US minerals.

"We are doing very well regarding Ukraine and Russia. And one of the things we are doing is signing an agreement in the near future on rare land with Ukraine," he said.

President Trump referred to his separate discussions this week with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky aimed at ending Russia's war in Ukraine.

The talks, which failed to reach Trump's goal of securing a full ceasefire for 30 days, resulted in President Putin agreeing to stop Russia's attack on energy infrastructure for 30 days and President Zelensky said he would also accept the pause.

"We wanted to see the (war) end, and I think we did pretty well at that," said President Trump.

"So hopefully we can save thousands of people a week from death. That's the point. They died very unnecessaryly, and I'm sure we will solve it," said President Trump.

Earlier, Ukraine and the US said this month they had agreed to conclude a comprehensive agreement as soon as possible to develop Ukraine's important mineral resources, which President Trump sees as a way to repay the United States for its assistance to Kyiv.

Attempts to seal the deal stalled after a disaster-causing White House meeting between leaders of the two countries at the end of last month.

President Trump and President Zelensky agreed on Wednesday to work together to end Russia's war with Ukraine, in what the White House described as a "fatastically" one-hour phone call, their first conversation since an argument in the Oval Room resulted in a temporary suspension of US military and intelligence assistance to Kyiv.

It is unclear whether the deal has changed. Previous versions did not include Ukraine's explicit security guarantee, but gave the US access to Ukraine's natural resources.

The deal also envisions the Ukrainian government accounting 50 percent of the amount raised for state-owned natural resources to US-Ukraine-run reconstruction investment funds.

When asked how the current version of the mineral deal differs from the previous draft, a senior US official said the deal was "in more detail and comprehensive," refusing to elaborate.