Russia Floats Cooperation on Rare Earth Metals It Says US Needs

Russia is ready to cooperate with Washington on developing rare-earth elements that the US needs, the Kremlin said amid the start of a broader thaw in relations since Donald Trump came to office.

“The Americans need rare-earth metals; we have a lot of them,” President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said to reporters on Tuesday, according to the Interfax news service. “This opens up rather broad prospects for cooperation.”

Russia floated the idea of cooperating on mineral development after Kyiv pushed back against US demands for a $500 billion fund as part of a wider deal to give ...