US wants Europe’s largest nuclear plant for cryptomining – Putin
Washington is interested in using its proposed stake in the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) for a cryptomining operation, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a meeting with business leaders on Thursday, according to Kommersant.
The facility has been fully controlled by Russian forces since 2022 and has reportedly figured in US President Donald Trump’s proposed 28-point peace roadmap for Ukraine.
In the ongoing US-Russian negotiations, the president’s envoys have shown interest in sharing control of the plant with Moscow and using Washington’s stake to mine cryptocurrency, Putin said, business daily Kommersant wrote on Thursday.
Moscow is also considering a US proposal for the plant to once again provide electricity for Ukraine, he reportedly said.
Russia is currently analyzing a counteroffer from Washington in the latest round of shuttle diplomacy, after Putin envoy Kirill Dmitriev’s recent return from Miami, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists on Thursday.
A day earlier, Vladimir Zelensky unveiled his own draft plan, in which he wanted the Russian-held ZNPP to be controlled by Ukraine and the US on a 50/50 basis.
The Ukrainian leader has also demanded territorial concessions from Moscow, which currently holds the initiative on the front line. He also called for Ukraine to maintain an 800,000-strong peacetime army and “Article-5-like” security guarantees from Washington, NATO and Kiev’s European backers.
Moscow has maintained that Ukraine and its Western European sponsors have deliberately undermined the US peace push with complete non-starters for Russia.
The provisions they have attempted to introduce “did not improve the documents or chances of reaching long-term peace,” senior Russian negotiator and Kremlin foreign policy aide Yury Ushakov said earlier this week.
