In a rare joint trip, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, whose Labor government took office two months ago and pledged to maintain Britain’s role as Ukraine’s main defender, left for Kyiv by train. Both boarded a train in the Polish border town of Przemyśl early Wednesday to meet in Kyiv with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is pressing the West to provide more powerful weapons and ease restrictions on their use.
U.S. President Joe Biden, when asked in Washington if he would allow Ukraine to use longer-range weapons, said: “We’re working on that right now.” Mr. Biden, who strongly supports Ukraine, has previously made it clear that he wants to avoid direct conflict between the United States and Russia, the world’s two largest nuclear powers.
Blinken, speaking alongside Lammy in London on Tuesday, said the United States was committed to giving Ukraine “what it needs, when it needs it, to counter Russian aggression as effectively as possible.” However, A. Blinken, who is traveling to Kyiv for the fifth time since the beginning of the war, also said that it is no less important that the Ukrainian forces can operate and use specific weapons.
In a later interview with Sky News, pressed to say whether the United States would give the green light to the use of long-range weapons, Mr. Blinken replied: “We never rule out, but when we do, we want to make sure that it will help the Ukrainians achieve what they are trying to achieve.” .
Fear of Iranian missiles
The debate over the use of long-range weapons has been renewed after the US said Iran had sent short-range missiles to Russia that will hit Ukraine within weeks. This has raised fears that Moscow will be free to use its long-range missiles against relatively intact areas of western Ukraine. Western countries have announced new sanctions against Iran.
Earlier this year, the US authorized Ukraine to use Western weapons to strike across the border in a direct conflict with Russian forces. But last month, Ukraine sprung a surprise by invading Russian territory in Kursk.
British media reported that Mr Biden intends to end his objections to allowing Ukraine to use long-range Storm Shadow missiles against Russia during a meeting with Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Friday. Britain has long urged the United States to do so.
One of Ukraine’s main requests is to lift restrictions on US-supplied ATACMS tactical missile systems, which can hit targets 300 kilometers away.
In a joint letter to Mr. Biden, members of Congress from the rival Republican Party asked him to take immediate action on ATACMS and prevent Russia from having a safe haven “from which it can commit war crimes against Ukraine with impunity.” That’s according to a letter signed by Mike McCauley, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
But Republicans are deeply divided over Ukraine, and a victory by their presidential candidate, Donald Trump, over Biden’s political heir, Kamala Harris, in the November election could dramatically change US politics. Trump’s aides have made it clear that if he wins, he would use aid to Ukraine as leverage to force Kyiv to make territorial concessions to Russia to end the war.
2024-09-11 10:30:27