In an interview on 10 February 2025, US President Donald Trump stated that the US should receive US$500 billion worth of rare earths from Ukraine as compensation for continued US military support to the country in resisting Russia’s war of aggression. Ukraine is known to possess deposits of 25 of the 34 raw materials identified as critical by the EU. Just days earlier, on 7 February, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had reaffirmed his openness to the idea of granting the US rights to exploit Ukrainian critical minerals, having previously included critical minerals as part of a ‘victory plan’ presented to the US in September 2024. In January 2025, the Ukrainian government announced that it was working on deals with Western allies, including the US, Britain, France and Italy, involving the exploitation of critical materials.
However, many of Ukraine’s resources are located in the east and south, in areas that are either contested or occupied by Russia. According to the Ukrainian government, about 20 % of Ukraine’s minerals and half of its rare earth deposits are under Russian occupation. Current mappings of Ukraine’s supposed mineral wealth also rely on outdated Soviet-era surveys, which did not consider the cost or viability of developing those deposits, with many rare earth sites estimated to be unprofitable to extract.
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