By Necva Tastan Sevinc
ISTANBUL (AA) - Former UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace has criticized the US over its conditions on mineral deal with Ukraine, calling them "total extortion."
"The mineral deal, ... it's total extortion," Wallace told CNN on Wednesday.
"The reality is, (US President) Donald Trump, at one level, wants to prove to his electorate who's just sent him to the White House 'I got something back'," Wallace added, referring to Trump's push for concessions from Ukraine.
"That’s what the mineral deal is about," he added.
Wallace pointed out that the vast majority of Western aid to Ukraine was structured as military assistance, often involving the transfer of older equipment that allowed donor nations to modernize their own arsenals.
"The United States and Europe gave most of the aid on condition of gifting, certainly the military equipment," he said, adding that "a lot of it was actually in the Pentagon’s budget" and ended up benefiting American defense companies.
According to Wallace, Ukraine is now being forced to navigate US financial demands while receiving no firm security guarantees in return.
"I’m not sure (Trump) has a right to extort anything from Ukraine, who's, by the way, desperate and trying to survive," he said.
Drawing a historical comparison, Wallace noted that the US has a long-standing expectation of repayment for its wartime financial support.
"Britain stopped paying its war loans to the United States in 2006,” he said, referring to the debts incurred during World War II.
Wallace warned that the current arrangement offers "no security guarantees" for Kyiv.
Ukraine is sitting on massive reserves of critical rare earth minerals that could total trillions of dollars. It holds about 5% of the world’s total mineral resources, according to a 2024 World Economic Forum report.
Besides having one of the largest confirmed reserves of lithium, Ukraine boasts semiconductor-grade neon gas that is critical for chip production, beryllium, uranium, zirconium, apatite, iron ore, and manganese.
Negotiations had centered on two major sticking points between Washington and Kyiv, including security guarantees for Ukraine and whether the mineral rights would be exchanged solely for future US military aid, or if they would cover previous installments that were given to Kyiv by the former Joe Biden administration.