NEW YORK, February 25. /TASS/. US President Donald Trump will meet with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin as well as with Vladimir Zelensky very soon, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said during a Fox News TV broadcast.

"We expect those meetings to take place very soon, especially the meeting with President Zelensky," she said.

The White House press secretary noted that Trump wants the rare-earth metals deal between Kiev and Washington to be signed. "He expects President Zelensky to sign that deal. It’s only right, considering what the American taxpayers have done for Ukraine. If it weren’t for the American people, Ukraine wouldn’t be a country anymore. And President Trump knows that, and he’s getting the American people what they deserve," Leavitt added.

In early February, Trump said that Washington was interested in obtaining rare-earth metals from Ukraine. Zelensky, in turn, noted his readiness to make a deal and suggested that the outcome of negotiations on this issue could be determined at the Munich Security Conference on February 14-16. However, on February 14 in Munich, the Kiev authorities rejected the US administration's plan to help Ukraine in exchange for Washington's right to 50% of Ukraine's rare-earth metals. At the same time, Zelensky pointed out that there were no security guarantees in the proposed agreement. Kiev said it was working on a counterproposal.

On February 21, US national security adviser Mike Waltz said that Zelensky would sign an agreement with Washington in the near future. After that, sources in Zelensky's office told the Ukrainian media that the document had yet to be finalized, while Zelensky himself said at a press conference on February 23 that he "does not want to sign" the agreement with the US because it would supposedly make ten generations of Ukrainians pay for it.