2023-12-06 16:48:50
A few hours before the United States Senate decides on the $61.4 billion in aid that the White House is urgently requesting for Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky unexpectedly resigned from speaking before legislators in the closed preparatory meetings.
The change of plans was interpreted by many in Ukraine as a confirmation that the proposal by President Joe Biden’s Administration to continue sending aid to Kiev has no chance of being approved in the vote this Wednesday in the Senate, where the Republicans They are preparing to vote against.
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One of the clearest interpretations has been made from Washington by the Ukrainian opposition deputy Oleksí Goncharenko.
From the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky.
The legislator from the European Solidarity party, led by former President Petro Poroshenko, recalled that, in both the US Congress and Senate, Republicans have conditioned the approval of aid to Ukraine on Democrats agreeing to introduce tougher measures. against illegal immigration.
Biden’s party does not accept this transaction, so assistance to Ukraine is doomed to rejection, first by the Senate and then by Congress, according to Goncharenko.
“Under these circumstances, Zelensky’s intervention before senators in a closed session would not have changed anything,” Goncharenko wrote on his social networks.
“What’s more, the failure in the vote despite his message could seem like a defeat for Zelensky, something that no politician likes, least of all someone with the ego of Volodímir Oleksándrovich,” added the opposition legislator, using the president’s patronymic. .
One of the official explanations for Zelensky’s decision not to address US lawmakers has been given by Ukraine’s ambassador to Washington, Oksana Markarova.
(Keep reading: The United States warns that military aid to Ukraine will run out by the end of the year.)
“The idea had been raised to participate, if possible, in one of the many sessions. Because they were going to talk not only about Ukraine, but also about other internal issues, we decided not to participate,” the diplomat said.
“Nothing catastrophic has happened,” Markarova added.
The Ukrainian Minister of Defense, Rustem Umérov, also offered his explanation, who attributes Zelensky’s decision not to intervene to the urgency of the war context that Ukraine is experiencing.
From the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenski, in the UN General Assembly.
“There is a war, so the situation can change. But I think President Zelensky would appreciate it and do it (address lawmakers) as soon as possible next time,” Umerov said in an interview with the American conservative network Fox News.
Umerov is in the United States accompanied by the head of the Ukrainian Parliament, Ruslan Stefanchuk, and the head of the Ukrainian presidential office and President Zelensky’s right-hand man, Andri Yermak.
The delegation highlights Ukraine’s chances of obtaining, before the end of the year, a positive decision from the US legislative branch on the continuation of military and financial aid to kyiv.
In a speech delivered this Tuesday in Washington, Yermak himself acknowledged that there is “a great risk” that Ukraine will be defeated if US assistance is not unblocked.
Rustem Umerov, Minister of Defense of Ukraine.
The stagnation of the front recognized in November by the head of the Ukrainian Army, Valeri Zaluzhni, combined with the uncertainty about the capital aid offered by the US, have opened the door to criticism against Zelensky from opposition sectors.
The mayor of Kiev and old political enemy of Zelensky Vitali Klichó accused him of selling an excessively “euphoric” account of the war against the realism of Zaluzhni, whose conclusions about the “positional” phase in which the conflict would have entered were not accepted by President.
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The Ukrainian strategy to overcome republican resistance has also been the subject of criticism. Oleksí Goncharenko, the opposition deputy, has complained on several occasions that Zelensky did not sooner send delegations of legislators from across the parliamentary spectrum to the United States to convince, with a range of arguments, skeptical Republicans of the relevance of continue supporting Kiev.
Former presidential advisor Oleksí Arestovich, who ran as a candidate for when the next elections for the head of state are held, said that on three occasions Republican senators whom he had invited to Ukraine were unable to meet with Zelensky due to changes last minute agenda. The events would have occurred more than a year ago.
Meanwhile, some analysts consider the Republican rejection a matter of internal politics in which Ukraine had and continues to have little room for influence.
EFE
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