Trump says Zelenskyy also willing to sign a critical minerals deal, days after their blow-up at the Oval Office.
United States President Donald Trump has revealed he received a letter from Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy, saying he is ready for talks with Russia and to sign a rare minerals deal.
“Ukraine is ready to come to the negotiating table as soon as possible to bring lasting peace closer. Nobody wants peace more than the Ukrainians,” Trump said in an address to Congress on Tuesday night while quoting from the letter.
“‘My team and I stand ready to work under President Trump’s strong leadership to get a peace that lasts’,” Trump quoted Zelenskyy as writing.
“Wouldn’t that be beautiful?” he said. “It’s time to stop this madness. It’s time to halt the killing. It’s time to end this senseless war. If you want to end wars, you have to talk to both sides.”
Trump’s revelation came days after a heated exchange between him and Zelenskyy at the Oval Office saw the US suspend crucial military aid to Ukraine in the fourth year of its war with Russia.
Zelenskyy has since sought to bring Trump back onside, posting on social media that their clash was “regrettable” and that he wanted “to make things right”.
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In his Congress address, Trump also said Ukraine was ready to sign an agreement for rare earth minerals “at any time that is convenient for you”, giving no further details.
Ukraine is believed to have deposits of strategically important minerals – including titanium, lithium and manganese – that could be useful for US aerospace, electric vehicle and medical manufacturing.
The Trump administration has been making the case that tightening economic ties with Ukraine through an agreement that gives the US access to those valuable mineral deposits would stop Russia from acting against Kyiv in the future.
Zelenskyy had left the deal on the table during his visit to Washington, DC, after the Oval Office argument with Trump, as US Vice President JD Vance accused the Ukrainian leader of being ungrateful for US assistance, and Trump said he had no “cards” to play.
Al Jazeera’s Alan Fisher, reporting from Washington, DC, said Zelenskyy saying he wants to get around the negotiating table “suggests that what happened on Friday didn’t go the way that he wanted”.
“There was pressure on him [Zelenskyy] to do a deal. And he is willing to accept what Donald Trump is ready to offer at this point, which includes access to rare earth minerals in his country, in exchange for some level of American support,” he added.
While Trump was expected to use Tuesday’s speech to lay out a plan for the Ukraine war, he did not further detail how he envisages ending the three-year conflict. However, he did say he had engaged in “serious discussions with Russia”.
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Meanwhile, the Kremlin said cutting off US military aid to Ukraine was the best possible step towards peace, although it was waiting to confirm Trump’s move.
US Democrats have raised an outcry over Trump’s abrupt pivot towards Russia, the most dramatic geopolitical shift in generations for Washington, DC, where governments under both parties since the 1940s have prioritised defending Europe from a hostile Moscow.