Washington provides $200 million to help Kiev

A senior US official, who asked not to be named, said the Biden administration “approved last month to provide $200 million in additional defense security assistance to our Ukrainian partners.” The person in charge did not disclose the nature of the assistance.

Washington provided $450 million in military aid before Russian forces moved to the Ukrainian border late last year. Washington has already announced several times that it is ready to provide military assistance to Ukraine.

Minister Blinkin called on Russian President Vladimir Putin in Kiev on Wednesday to take the “peaceful path” out of the crisis surrounding Ukraine. “I very much hope that we can continue down a diplomatic and peaceful path, but in the end that will be President Putin’s decision,” Blinken said during a visit to the US embassy in the Ukrainian capital.

View | The White House said Russia could launch an attack on Ukraine “at any moment.”

aggressive actions

And the US secretary of state warned that if Putin chose “confrontation,” it would have “consequences for Russia.” “We know he has plans to increase that force very soon, to take new aggressive measures against Ukraine,” he said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky received Blinkin in Kiev. He thanked the United States for its “support in these difficult times.”

Thousands of Russian troops have been deployed to the Ukrainian border. This raises the fear of invasion.

Belarus, which is also Ukraine’s neighbor, announced on Tuesday that Russian forces had arrived to conduct the exercises. The scale of these exercises worries the West, too. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko is an ally of Putin.

Russia demands that Ukraine not join the NATO Military Treaty Organization. But, according to Blinkin, Moscow is acting without provocation.