Washington will abandon its efforts to broker a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine ‘within days’ unless there are clear signs a settlement can be reached, the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, said. Kyiv said it has signed a memorandum with the US over a controversial minerals deal. After meeting European and Ukrainian leaders, Rubio said Donald Trump was still interested in a deal but that the US president had many other priorities and was willing to move on unless there were signs of progress