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Rare earths deal aims to counter China's supply control

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US, Australia to invest $1 billion each in mining projects

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Trump backs AUKUS submarine deal despite prior review

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Trump tells Ambassador Rudd: 'I don't like you either'

(Adds Export-Import Bank letters of intent with seven

Australian firms in paragraph 9)

By Andrea Shalal, Steve Holland and Ernest Scheyder

WASHINGTON, Oct 20 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald

Trump and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese signed a

critical minerals agreement aimed at countering China on Monday

at a meeting marked by Trump's jab at Australia's envoy to the

United States over past criticism.

China loomed large at the first White House summit between

Trump and Albanese, with the U.S. president also backing a

strategic nuclear-powered submarine deal with Australia to

bolster security in the Indo-Pacific.

While Trump and Albanese greeted each other warmly, the U.S.

president expressed ire about past criticism of him by

Australia's U.S. ambassador Kevin Rudd, a former prime minister.

Rudd in 2020 called Trump "the most destructive president in

history," later deleting the comment from social media.

Trump said he was not aware of the critical comments and

asked where the envoy was now. Upon seeing him across the table,

Trump said, "I don't like you either, and I probably never

will."

The visit otherwise appeared to go smoothly, with Albanese

and Trump signing a minerals deal that Trump said had been

negotiated in recent months. Albanese described it as an $8.5

billion pipeline "that we have ready to go."

A copy of the agreement released by both governments said

the two countries will each invest $1 billion over the next six

months into mining and processing projects as well as set a

minimum price floor for critical minerals, a move that Western

miners have long sought.

A White House statement on the agreement added that the

investments would target deposits of critical minerals worth $53

billion, although it did not provide details on which types or

locations.

"In about a year from now, we'll have so much critical

mineral and rare earths that you won't know what to do with

them," Trump told reporters.

EXIM ANNOUNCES OVER $2.2 BILLION IN INVESTMENTS

The U.S. Export-Import Bank, which acts as the U.S.

government's export credit agency, later announced seven letters

of interest totaling more than $2.2 billion to advance critical

minerals projects in Australia. It said the letters went to

Arafura Rare Earths, Northern Minerals,

Graphinex, Latrobe Magnesium, VHM, RZ

Resources, and Sunrise Energy Metals.

EXIM said the projects span a range of critical minerals

essential to advanced defense systems, aerospace components,

communications equipment, and next-generation industrial

technologies.

The investments would help support the re-industrialization

of America's high-tech manufacturing base, while helping to

"counter China's export dominance and ensure Western

supply-chain resilience," it said.

Additionally, the Pentagon plans to build a gallium

refinery in Western Australia. China blocked gallium exports to

the United States last December.

The United States has been looking to boost its access to

critical minerals around the world as China takes steps to

strengthen control over global supply. Trade tensions between

the United States and China have escalated ahead of Trump's

meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in South Korea next

week.

The term critical minerals applies to a range of minerals,

including rare earths, lithium and nickel.

China has the world's largest rare earths reserves,

according to U.S. Geological Survey data, but Australia also has

significant reserves. The minerals are used for products ranging

from electric vehicles to aircraft engines and military radars.

TRUMP SIGNALS SUPPORT FOR SUBMARINE DEAL

Albanese got welcome support from Trump for the A$368

billion ($239.46 billion) AUKUS agreement, reached in 2023 under

then-President Joe Biden. Under the deal, Australia is to buy

U.S. nuclear-powered submarines in 2032 before building a new

submarine class with Britain.

While Trump has been eager to roll back Biden-era policies,

he signaled his intent to back the AUKUS submarine agreement,

months after his team launched a review of the deal over

concerns about the ability of the United States to meet its own

submarine needs.

Navy Secretary John Phelan told the meeting the United

States and Australia were working closely to improve the

original AUKUS framework for all three parties "and clarify some

of the ambiguity that was in the prior agreement."

Trump said these were "just minor details," adding that

"there shouldn't be any more clarifications, because we're just

- we're just going now full steam ahead, building."

Ahead of Monday's meeting, Australian officials emphasized

that their country is paying its way under AUKUS, contributing

$2 billion this year to boost production rates at U.S. submarine

shipyards, and preparing to maintain U.S. Virginia-class

submarines at its Indian Ocean naval base from 2027.

The delay of 10 months in an official meeting since Trump

took office had caused some anxiety in Australia as the Pentagon

urged the Australian government to increase defense spending.

The two leaders met briefly on the sidelines of the United

Nations General Assembly in New York last month.

The rare earths agreement came a week after U.S. officials

condemned China's expansion of rare earth export controls as a

threat to global supply chains.

Resource-rich Australia, wanting to extract and process rare

earths, put preferential access to its strategic reserve on the

table in U.S. trade negotiations in April.

As part of the rare earths agreement, Trump and Albanese

agreed to cut permitting for mines, processing facilities and

related operations in order to boost production.

The deal called for cooperation on the mapping of geological

resources, minerals recycling and efforts to stop the sale of

critical minerals assets "on national security grounds."

This was an oblique reference to China, which has bought

major mining assets across the planet in the past decade,

including the world's largest cobalt mine in Congo, from

U.S.-based Freeport-McMoRan ( FCX ) in 2016.

$1 = 1.5368 Australian dollars)