President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, throughout a closed-door assembly on Wednesday, rejected a suggestion by the Trump administration to relinquish half of the nation’s mineral sources in alternate for U.S. help, in accordance with 5 folks briefed on the proposal or with direct data of the talks.

The bizarre deal would have granted the US a 50 p.c curiosity in all of Ukraine’s mineral sources, together with graphite, lithium and uranium, as compensation for previous and future help in Kyiv’s warfare effort in opposition to Russian invaders, in accordance with two European officers. A Ukrainian official and an power skilled briefed on the proposal stated that the Trump administration additionally sought Ukrainian power sources.

Negotiations are persevering with, in accordance with one other Ukrainian official, who, just like the others, spoke on the situation of anonymity given the sensitivity of the talks. However the expansiveness of the proposal, and the tense negotiations round it, display the widening chasm between Kyiv and Washington over each continued U.S. help and a possible finish to the warfare.

The request for half of Ukraine’s minerals was made on Wednesday, when the U.S. Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, met with Mr. Zelensky in Kyiv, the primary go to by a Trump administration official to Ukraine. The Treasury Division declined to remark about any negotiation.

After seeing the proposal, the Ukrainians determined to evaluation the main points and supply a counterproposal when Mr. Zelensky visited the Munich Safety Convention on Friday and met with Vice President JD Vance, in accordance with the official.

It isn’t clear if a counterproposal was introduced.

Mr. Zelensky, chatting with reporters in Munich on Saturday, acknowledged he had rejected a proposal from the Trump administration. He didn’t specify what the phrases of the deal have been, apart from to say that it had not included safety ensures from Washington.

“I don’t see this connection within the doc,” he stated. “For my part, it’s not prepared to guard us, our pursuits.”

The safety assure is essential, as a result of Ukrainians imagine the US and Britain have did not stay as much as their obligations to guard the nation underneath an settlement signed on the finish of the Chilly Warfare, when Ukraine gave up the Russian nuclear weapons on its territory.

European diplomats had one other objection. They complained that the negotiation reeked of colonialism, an period when Western international locations exploited smaller or weaker nations for commodities.

In Munich, a gulf additionally appeared over the Trump administration’s plans to finish the warfare between the US and its European allies. Lots of them stated they have been extra confused than earlier than they’d arrived.

A Ukrainian official and an power skilled briefed on Mr. Bessent’s provide stated it lined not simply half of Ukraine’s minerals, but in addition different pure sources similar to oil and fuel. The official additionally stated the proposal gave the US a declare to half of Ukraine’s earnings from useful resource extraction and the sale of latest extraction licenses.

Acceding to those calls for would deprive the Ukrainian authorities of tens of millions of {dollars} in income which are presently virtually fully invested within the nation’s protection. Within the first half of final 12 months, Naftogaz, Ukraine’s state-owned oil and fuel big, reported a revenue exceeding half a billion {dollars}.

The thought of leveraging Ukraine’s mineral sources started to take form final summer time. Mr. Zelensky’s authorities, attempting to enchantment to Mr. Trump’s business-minded strategy and fearing he would comply with by on his guarantees to chop off army and monetary support to Ukraine, determined to pitch a deal that may basically commerce Ukrainian essential minerals for American support.

The Ukrainian president introduced the thought to Mr. Trump throughout a September assembly in New York, and the proposal gained backing from influential political figures, together with Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican. It additionally got here after U.S. businessmen — together with as Ronald S. Lauder, a rich pal of Mr. Trump’s — confirmed curiosity in investing in Ukraine’s mineral sources.

Kyiv had all the time maintained that entry to its pure sources would are available alternate for robust safety ensures from Washington. However one of many Ukrainian officers stated that the proposal made no such dedication, as an alternative framing the entry to Ukraine’s sources as overdue fee for previous American army and monetary support.

Ukraine has 109 important mineral deposits, together with these with ores of titanium, lithium and uranium, in accordance with an inventory compiled by the Kyiv Faculty of Economics, along with oil and pure fuel fields. Some, although, are in territory already underneath Russian occupation or near the entrance line.

Their worth is unsure. Other than the dangers of a repeat Russian invasion after a cease-fire — a danger a take care of the US is meant to cut back — deeply entrenched issues in Ukraine’s enterprise local weather have hobbled funding for a lot of the nation’s post-independence historical past.

These embody arcane regulation and insider dealing by Ukrainian businessmen and politicians, which may restrict any income from the association. Even earlier than the warfare, few traders have been takers on Ukrainian mining offers.

However there may be precedent for Ukraine to combine safety and enterprise with the US underneath Mr. Trump. In his first time period, in 2017, he struck a deal for Ukraine to purchase coal from Pennsylvania to exchange coal from mines in Ukraine misplaced underneath Russian occupation after the 2014 invasion.

Kostiantyn Yelisieiev, a former diplomat and the deputy chief of workers underneath Ukraine’s president on the time the settlement was struck, recalled that the deal had allowed Mr. Trump to declare that he had saved jobs in Pennsylvania, a swing state. For Kyiv, the settlement opened the door for Mr. Trump to supply deadly army support to Ukraine with the approval for gross sales of Javelin anti-tank missiles.

On the time, Ukrainian officers noticed it as successful, Mr. Yelisieiev stated. “It confirmed that Trump is just not an individual of values, however an individual of pursuits and cash,” and that Ukraine may discover a strategy to work with him on safety, he stated.

However the deal underneath dialogue now, he stated, elevates the strategy in ways in which may hand Russia a propaganda win by casting the warfare as a battle for pure sources, not Ukrainian independence or democracy.

“It’s extra essential to say that is about defending democracies and defeating Putin,” he stated.