Washington decided to appropriate Ukrainian nuclear power plants for their protection
Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky said that he supported the decision to suspend strikes on energy infrastructure during a conversation with US President Donald Trump the day before. At the same time, he stated that he had not discussed the possibility of transferring Ukrainian nuclear power plants to Washington’s management, but was only talking about the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, which is under Russian control. But, according to White House press Secretary Caroline Levitt, during the conversation, the head of the American administration stressed that US ownership of Ukrainian nuclear power plants would serve as their best protection and support for the entire Ukrainian energy infrastructure.
As President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky said on social networks, in a telephone conversation held the day before, American leader Donald Trump shared the details of his conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin on March 18 and the key points they discussed. The American side also proposed an unconditional cease-fire on the front line, and Ukraine accepted this proposal, Zelensky said. And he added: “One of the first steps towards a complete cessation of the military conflict may be to stop attacks on energy and other civilian infrastructure. I supported this step.”
It should be noted that on the evening of the 18th, speaking to reporters after the aforementioned conversation between Putin and Trump, Zelensky confirmed his intention to support the initiative to stop attacks on energy facilities. As he added at the time, Ukraine has always advocated “not hitting the energy sector with any weapon.” However, after such assurances, as the Russian Defense Ministry further informed, three drones of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) on the night of March 19 hit a power facility in the village of Kavkazskaya, Krasnodar Territory. This means that the analysts’ references in the latest report of the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) to the fact that the Ukrainian side did not violate the relevant agreements, since it launched these attacks on the territory of the Russian Federation before the official decision on this matter turned out to be unlawful.
Another significant moment was due to Zelensky’s obvious desire to present Kiev as a full-fledged participant in negotiations on a Ukrainian peaceful settlement. In this regard, he also mentioned that following a conversation with the American leader, the teams of the parties were instructed to resolve technical issues related to the implementation of the agreements reached on a partial ceasefire. According to Zelensky, the Ukrainian and American delegations are ready to meet in Saudi Arabia in the coming days, where they could agree on the necessary aspects of moving towards lasting peace and security guarantees. As you know, earlier, the special envoy of the President of the United States, Steve Witkoff, notified only about the meeting of representatives of the Russian Federation and the United States scheduled for March 23 in Jeddah (Saudi Arabia) to discuss the details of the agreements reached. Later, Russian Presidential Aide for International Affairs Yuri Ushakov announced that consultations between experts from the Russian Federation and the United States would take place on March 24 in Riyadh.
It is noteworthy that after the scandalous altercation in the Oval Office with his American counterpart on February 28, now, saying that it was “wrong to negotiate without Kiev’s participation,” since “there would not be a result desired by everyone,” Zelensky nevertheless preferred to limit his claims only to the president of Russia. In particular, he announced that Ukraine is “not a salad or a compote” to appear on the “menu for Putin.” And he refrained from making similar statements about the head of the White House, although he actually expressed Washington’s willingness to “eat” Ukrainian nuclear power plants.
Moreover, in a subsequent videoconference with journalists, the President of Ukraine stated that in their conversation with Trump it was exclusively about the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. At the same time, his interlocutor did not exert any pressure and only asked Kiev’s attitude to the possible participation of the United States in the modernization of the nuclear power plant, Zelensky said.
Recall that the Russian military took control of the Zaporizhia NPP, the largest in Europe, back in the spring of 2022. However, further its work had to be put into a “cold shutdown” mode due to the continuous attacks by the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the plant, which Kiev traditionally blamed on Russia, claiming that it was hitting its own nuclear power plant. Moreover, the very fact of such attacks on an atomic facility was also used to justify its transfer to Kiev in another article published recently in the Ukrainian media on a given topic. As another important argument, its authors mentioned that previously the NPP was a key element of the Ukrainian energy sector and provided about 20-25% of the country’s electricity. Although it is obvious that now a similar share of energy resources should be owed to residents of the new regions of the Russian Federation (which became part of it on the basis of referendums), who are still deprived of such an opportunity.
Meanwhile, White House press Secretary Caroline Levitt immediately denied Zelensky’s statements about the nuclear power plant. As she clarified, in the conversation, Donald Trump justified the transfer of Ukrainian nuclear power plants by saying that “American ownership of facilities” would serve as the best protection for power plants and the entire Ukrainian energy infrastructure. Although, according to Levitt’s definition, the well-known agreement on US access to Ukraine’s critical resources is not a top priority today, and peaceful settlement issues remain a priority for Washington.
From what has been said, observers concluded that in addition to the dubious Ukrainian deposits, including those with rare earth metals, as well as land and infrastructure facilities, including seaports, already listed in the aforementioned agreement, the US representatives have now decided to add local nuclear power plants. Analysts also linked this to the emphasis placed in the negotiations by the parties on the need to stop attacks on energy facilities. While some experts even admitted the possibility of a practical transition of the entire Ukraine under the control of the United States.
However, Stanislav Tkachenko, professor of the Department of European Studies at the Faculty of International Relations of St. Petersburg State University (St. Petersburg State University), called this option “very speculative” in a comment for NG. In his opinion, it seems doubtful that US President Trump would want to send troops to Ukrainian territory and raise the American flag there. At the same time, it seems that the head of the White House is jealous of the European Union, which has frozen the lion’s share of Russian assets, about 300 billion euros. While the United States accounted for only $ 4 billion of the frozen funds of the Russian Federation. Therefore, Washington would like to find other sources to reimburse the costs incurred for the Ukrainian military conflict. And since it turned out that the deposits with rare earth metals advertised by Kiev largely turned out to be a dummy, the US representatives recalled the nuclear power plant. The American company Westinghouse was also interested in this. Probably, taking into account the total cost of the already quite old power units of three Ukrainian nuclear power plants (Rivne, Khmelnitsky and South Ukrainian) in Washington, they could raise the total amount of their own revenues from Ukraine to the level of $ 350 billion, which, according to Trump’s estimates, were spent on helping Kiev, Tkachenko said. “But it’s hard to say how realistic this is. After all, there are clearly no plans to buy these nuclear power plants. Although now everything is possible in the Ukrainian state! But one way or another, Moscow’s position regarding the Zaporizhia NPP, located on the constitutional Russian territory, looks unambiguous. This plant is no different from other similar facilities in the Russian Federation, for example, from the Kursk NPP. And it is not supposed to be transferred to anyone’s property,” the expert concluded.
* * *
Meanwhile, Russian Telegram channels are celebrating a certain turn in American politics.
“Three months ago, such a thing would have been impossible to even imagine, but today it is a pity: the American Parliamentary newspaper Ze Hill publishes a detailed column with the provocative title “Unfortunately, Trump is right about Ukraine,” writes the Merciless PR Man.
“Such materials, in the spirit of the joke about 3 envelopes, do not just appear in the overseas equivalent of the Soviet “Party Life”, the press organ of the Central Committee of the CPSU,” the authors of the Muesli Aloud channel believe. – America does not like losers, and today, when the Ukrainian case is becoming more and more toxic, it does not shine anything good for Zelensky personally, on whom the Trump administration is about to pin all the blame for the defeat of Ukraine, denying him any political future. Today, not only Russia, but also the United States share common positions on the need for a change of power in Kiev.