Ukraine, U.S. Sign Investment Agreement Despite Last-Minute Tensions

The Ukrainian-American agreement was signed in Washington last Wednesday following several months of tense negotiations. However, Ukraine requested changes to the deal at the last moment, Orda.kz reports.

The agreement provides for the creation of a special fund to finance Ukraine’s post-war recovery and to establish conditions for attracting investment in the mining and energy sectors. The deal does not prevent Kyiv from pursuing European Union membership in the future.

Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko outlined the key terms of the agreement on her Facebook page, stating that the fund will operate as a 50/50 partnership.

Ukraine and the United States will jointly manage it, with neither side holding a dominant vote.

According to Svyrydenko, the agreement contains no provisions creating debt obligations for Ukraine toward the United States.

All resources on our territory and in territorial waters belong to Ukraine. It is the Ukrainian state that determines where and what to extract. The subsoil remains in Ukrainian ownership,
she clarified. 

The agreement also complies with the Ukrainian constitution and “does not change the course of European integration.”

Svyrydenko expects that for the first 10 years of the fund’s operation, its income will be invested exclusively in new projects or the country’s reconstruction.

The full text of the agreement has not yet been published.

As reported by the BBC, representatives from Ukraine and the U.S. signed technical documents on Friday.

On the eve of the signing, Ukraine attempted to renegotiate already agreed-upon points of the deal.

According to the BBC’s source, the Ukrainian side sought to revisit several key items, including the fund’s management principles, transparency mechanisms, and measures to ensure full tracking of funds. Svyrydenko was reportedly told that she might not need to travel to the US if the agreement was not finalized.

Original Author: Oksana Matvienko