
Ukraine ratifies strategic minerals deal with US
The Ukrainian parliament ratified a milestone minerals deal with the United States on Thursday, lawmakers said.
A total of 338 parliamentarians voted in favor of ratification, and no one voted against, said Oleksandr Merezhko, head of the Ukrainian parliament's foreign affairs committee.
The agreement grants the US preferential access to Ukrainian mineral resources and paves a path for possible new military aid for Kyiv, although it lacks clear security guarantees.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Arab News
3 hours ago
- Arab News
Russia has plans to test NATO's resolve, German intelligence chief warns
BERLIN: Russia is determined to test the resolve of the NATO alliance, including by extending its confrontation with the West beyond the borders of Ukraine, the Germany's foreign intelligence chief told the Table Media news organization. Bruno Kahl, head of the Federal Intelligence Service, said his agency had clear intelligence indications that Russian officials believed the collective defense obligations enshrined in the NATO treaty no longer had practical force. 'We are quite certain, and we have intelligence showing it, that Ukraine is only a step on the journey westward,' Kahl told Table Media in a podcast interview. 'That doesn't mean we expect tank armies to roll westwards,' he added. 'But we see that NATO's collective defense promise is to be tested.' Germany, already the second-largest provider of armaments and financial support for Ukraine in its war with Russia, has pledged to step up its support further under the new government of Chancellor Friedrich Merz, promising to help Ukraine develop new missiles that could strike deep into Russian territory. Without detailing the nature of his intelligence sources, Kahl said Russian officials were envisaging confrontations that fell short of a full military engagement that would test whether the US would really live up to its mutual aid obligations under Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. 'They don't need to dispatch armies of tanks for that,' he said. 'It's enough to send little green men to Estonia to protect supposedly oppressed Russian minorities.' Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea involved occupation of buildings and offices by Russian soldiers in unmarked uniforms and civilian clothes, who came to be known as the 'little green men' when Moscow initially denied their identity. Kahl did not specify which officials in Moscow were thinking along these lines. Merz, who visited Donald Trump in Washington last week, pushed back against the US president's assertion that Ukraine and Russia were like two infants fighting, telling Trump that where Ukraine targeted Moscow's military, Russia bombed Ukraine's cities. Kahl said his contacts with US counterparts had left him convinced they took the Russian threat seriously. 'They take it as seriously as us, thank God,' he said.


Asharq Al-Awsat
9 hours ago
- Asharq Al-Awsat
'Mum, I'm home!' Russia and Ukraine Exchange Prisoners of War
Russia and Ukraine exchanged prisoners of war under the age of 25 on Monday in emotional homecoming scenes, the first step in a series of planned prisoner swaps that could become the biggest of the war so far. The exchange was the result of direct talks between the two sides in Istanbul on June 2 that resulted in an agreement to exchange at least 1,200 POWs on each side and to repatriate thousands of bodies of those killed in Russia's war in Ukraine. The return of POWs and the repatriation of the bodies of the dead is one of the few things the two sides have managed to agree on as broader negotiations have failed to get close to ending the war, now in its fourth year. Fighting has raged on, with Russia saying on Monday its forces had taken control of more territory in Ukraine's east-central region of Dnipropetrovsk and Kyiv saying Moscow had launched its largest drone attack of the war. Officials in Kyiv said some of the Ukrainian prisoners who came home on Monday had been in Russian captivity since the beginning of the war. At a rendezvous point for the returning Ukrainian prisoners, soon after they crossed back into northern Ukraine, an official handed one of the freed men a cellphone so that he could call his mother, a video released by Ukrainian authorities showed. "Hi mum, I've arrived, I'm home!" the soldier shouted into the receiver, struggling to catch his breath because he was overcome by emotion. The released Ukrainian men were later taken by bus to a hospital in northern Ukraine where they were to have medical checks and be given showers, food and care packages including mobile phones and shoes. Jubilation was tinged with sadness because outside the hospital were crowds of people, mostly women, looking for relatives who went missing while fighting for Ukraine. The women held up pictures of the missing men in the hope that one of the returning POWs would recognized them and share details about what happened to them. Some hoped their loved ones would be among those released. Oksana Kupriyenko, 52, was holding up an image of her son, Denys, who went missing in September 2024. "Tomorrow is my birthday and I was hoping God will give me a gift and return my son to me," she said, through tears. PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSISTANCE Neither side said how many prisoners had been swapped on Monday, but the Russian Defense Ministry said in its own statement that the same number of military personnel had been exchanged on each side. Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky said at the weekend that a first list of 640 POWs had been handed to Ukraine. The Russian military said its returned servicemen were now in Belarus, a close Russian ally, where they were receiving psychological and medical assistance before being transferred to Russia for further care. Footage broadcast by Russia's RIA state news agency showed a group of freed Russian soldiers on board a coach raising their hands in the air and shouting: "Hurrah we're home." The same group was shown holding a Russian flag and chanting "Russia! Russia!" before boarding the coach. "It is very difficult to convey what I'm feeling inside now. But I am very happy, proud and grateful to everyone who took part in this process, in the exchange and bringing us home," said one freed Russian soldier. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said his country had received a first group of prisoners from Russia and that it would take several days to complete the swap. Both sides say the intention for this round of prisoner swaps is also to hand over people who are gravely ill or severely injured. The people seen being handed over so far on Monday appeared to be fit and well. "Today's exchange has begun. It will be done in several stages in the coming days," Zelenskiy said on the Telegram app. "The process is quite complex, with many sensitive details, and negotiations continue virtually every day. We count on the full implementation of the humanitarian agreements reached during the meeting in Istanbul. We are doing everything possible to bring back every single person."


Saudi Gazette
11 hours ago
- Saudi Gazette
Iran says it obtained Israel's nuclear secrets without providing proof
TEHRAN — Iran claims it has obtained a large batch of information on Israel's nuclear program, its intelligence minister said on Sunday, without providing any evidence to support it. Speaking to Iranian state television after a cabinet meeting, Esmail Khatib said the Intelligence Ministry had acquired 'an important treasury of strategic, operational and scientific intelligence' from Israel, which he said had been 'transferred into the country with God's help.' Khatib alleged that thousands of documents had been seized, including information related to Europe, the US and other individual countries, though he did not explain how the intelligence was obtained. Khatib, a Shiite cleric who was sanctioned by the US Treasury in 2022 for his alleged involvement in cyber espionage, said the documents would be made public soon. He claimed they were retrieved through 'infiltration' and 'access to sources,' but offered no specifics or proof. The announcement, which came days before Tehran is expected to face renewed diplomatic pressure over its own atomic activities appears to be aimed at countering a high-profile Israeli intelligence operation in 2018. At the time, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his agents had smuggled out a 'half-tonne' of documents from Iran concerning its nuclear operation was cited by US President Donald Trump when he withdrew the US from the 2015 nuclear accord with latest Iranian claims come as the board of governors at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) prepares to meet this week, with Western nations reportedly planning to censure Iran over its failure to clarify long-standing questions about its nuclear a move could lead to the issue being referred to the UN Security Council and potentially trigger the reimposition of UN sanctions under the 'snapback' mechanism outlined in the 2015 has signaled it will reject a US-backed proposal after five rounds of nuclear talks, raising concerns of a renewed is currently enriching uranium up to 60% purity — just short of the 90% level needed for nuclear weapons — and has stockpiled enough material to build several an agreement, analysts warn that Iran's already struggling economy could worsen further, potentially fuelling domestic risk of Israeli or US military action against Iranian nuclear sites also remains, amid fears that Tehran could sever cooperation with the IAEA and dash toward developing a nuclear weapon. — Euronews