The United States and Britain have pledged to provide a combined total of nearly $1.5 billion in aid to Ukraine and promised to “swiftly” consider demands to lift restrictions on the use of Western weapons to strike deeper into Russia.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and British Foreign Secretary David Lammy made a rare joint visit to Kiev, where they met with government officials, including President Volodymyr Zelensky. The mission comes amid growing concerns over an escalation in the conflict, following Washington’s claim that Iran had already supplied short-range ballistic missiles to Russia. An accusation that has cost Tehran new Western sanctions, but the country has forcefully rejected the accusations, calling them “propaganda.”
Blinken announced that the United States will send $717 million in economic aid. About half of that amount will be directed to strengthening Ukraine’s electricity infrastructure, which has been hit by Russia just as winter has arrived. Blinken accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of “militarizing the cold against the Ukrainian people.” “Our support will not wane, our unity will not break,” the secretary of state promised at a joint press conference in Kiev.
Lammy, for his part, reaffirmed that the Labour government would provide the equivalent of $782 million in economic assistance to Ukraine; he then announced that Britain – which is pushing to ease restrictions on the use of Western weapons on Russian soil – would provide “hundreds” of new air defense missiles to Ukraine this year.
Blinken and Lammy’s trip – which will be followed by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s visit to Washington on Friday to meet US President Joe Biden – has inevitably raised expectations that Ukraine will soon be granted permission to launch Anglo-French Storm Shadow and US Atacms missiles with a range of 300 kilometres on Russian territory.
Zelensky has in recent months stepped up his calls for the West to provide weapons with more firepower and fewer restrictions. “It is important to eliminate any restrictions on the use of American and British weapons against legitimate military targets in Russia,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sibiga appealed after talks with his American and British counterparts.
While strongly supporting Ukraine, Biden has previously made clear that he wants to avoid the war from escalating into a direct conflict between the United States and Russia, the world’s two leading nuclear powers.
Asked how Moscow would respond to the lifting of restrictions on long-range weapons, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said only that the response “will be appropriate.”