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A pact meant to nudge Ukraine’s grinding conflict toward resolution unraveled on Friday, February 28, 2025, after a fiery showdown in the Oval Office with U.S. President Donald Trump stole the spotlight and sank the deal.
“It is our policy to continue what happened in the past, we’re constructive,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said, his voice steady amid the wreckage. “If we agreed to sign the minerals deal, we’re ready to sign it.”
Zelensky had jetted into Washington that day for a full-blown White House powwow, aiming to lock down a U.S.-Ukraine partnership to tap his country’s hefty mineral stash—a cornerstone of a Stateside-orchestrated plan to rebuild after years of war.
But the Oval Office sit-down turned into a slugfest when Trump lit into Zelensky, pressing him to show more gratitude for America’s three-year lifeline in the fight against Russia, growling that without Uncle Sam’s muscle, Ukraine would’ve been swallowed whole by Moscow—a public thrashing that left the deal in tatters.
“You’re either going to make a deal or we’re out,” Trump added. “And if we’re out, you’ll fight it out and I don’t think it’s going to be pretty.”
The US leader had previously said the proposed minerals deal would be “very fair”.
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The pitch was to hand Washington a slice of Ukraine’s economic pie in exchange for its role in brokering a ceasefire—though Trump’s kept his cards close, dodging any promise to throw U.S. troops into the mix alongside European forces eyeing a peacekeeping gig.
Post-clash, Zelensky peeled out in his convoy not long after getting the boot from the Oval Office on Friday, February 28, 2025, scrapping a planned tag-team presser. The White House confirmed the mineral pact stayed on ice, unsigned and adrift.
Come Sunday, Zelensky found a posse of backers at a powwow thrown by UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who spilled that a slew of European heavyweights vowed to pump more cash into defenses and cobble together a crew to shield any peace deal from crumbling.
Fresh off the London huddle, French President Emmanuel Macron, cruising homeward, tossed out a teaser to a newspaper: France and Britain are mulling a short, one-month breather with Russia—a trial balloon to test the waters.
