Trump Administration Resumes Military Aid And Intelligence Sharing With Ukraine | EUROtoday

JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — The Trump administration lifted its suspension of army assist and intelligence sharing for Ukraine, and Kyiv signaled that it was open to a 30-day ceasefire within the conflict with Russia, pending Moscow’s settlement, American and Ukrainian officers mentioned Tuesday following talks in Saudi Arabia.

The administration’s resolution marked a pointy shift from solely every week in the past, when it imposed the measures to push Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to enter talks to finish the conflict with invading Russian forces. The suspension of U.S. help got here days after Zelenskyy and Trump argued concerning the conflict in a tense White House assembly.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who led the U.S. delegation to the talks in Jeddah, mentioned Washington would current the ceasefire supply to the Kremlin, which has to date opposed something in need of a everlasting finish to the battle with out accepting any concessions.

“We’re going to tell them this is what’s on the table. Ukraine is ready to stop shooting and start talking. And now it’ll be up to them to say yes or no,” Rubio advised reporters after the assembly. “If they say no, then we’ll unfortunately know what the impediment is to peace here.”

President Donald Trump’s nationwide safety adviser, Mike Waltz, added: “The Ukrainian delegation today made something very clear, that they share President Trump’s vision for peace.”

Tuesday’s discussions, which lasted for almost eight hours, appeared to place relaxation, for the second at the very least, the animosity between Trump and Zelenskyy that erupted in the course of the Oval Office assembly final month.

Waltz mentioned the negotiators “got into substantive details on how this war is going to permanently end,” together with long-term safety ensures. And, he mentioned, Trump agreed to right away raise the pause within the provide of billions of of {dollars} of U.S. army assist and intelligence sharing.

Senior officers started assembly solely hours after Russia shot down over 300 Ukrainian drones. It was Ukraine’s largest assault because the Kremlin ordered the full-scale invasion of its neighbor. Neither U.S. nor Ukrainian officers supplied any touch upon the barrage.

Trump’s particular envoy, Steve Witkoff, is anticipated to journey later this week to Moscow, the place he might meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin, in line with an individual acquainted with the matter however not licensed to remark publicly. The particular person cautioned that scheduling might change.

Meanwhile, in an tackle posted shortly after Tuesday’s talks ended, Zelenskyy reiterated Ukraine’s dedication to reaching a long-lasting peace, emphasizing that the nation has sought an finish to the conflict since its outset.

“Our position is absolutely clear: Ukraine has strived for peace from the very first second of this war, and we want to do everything possible to achieve it as soon as possible — securely and in a way that ensures war does not return,” Zelenskyy mentioned.

Ukrainian presidential aide Andriy Yermak advised reporters forward of the talks that a very powerful factor was “how to achieve a just and lasting peace in Ukraine.” He mentioned safety ensures had been vital to stop Russia from invading once more sooner or later.

Elsewhere, Russia launched 126 drones and a ballistic missile at Ukraine, the Ukrainian air power mentioned, as a part of Moscow’s relentless pounding of civilian areas in the course of the conflict.

On the streets of Kyiv, Ukrainians stored a watch on the Saudi talks.

Lena Herasymenko, a psychologist, mentioned she accepts that compromises will probably be crucial to finish the conflict, however she mentioned they have to be “reasonable.”

“We had massive losses during this war, and we don’t know yet how much more we’ll have,” she advised The Associated Press. “We are suffering every day. Our kids are suffering, and we don’t know how the future generation will be affected.”

Oleksandr, a Ukrainian soldier who might give solely his first title due to safety restrictions, warned that Ukraine can’t let down its guard down.

“If there is a ceasefire, it would only give Russia time to increase its firepower, manpower, missiles and other arms. Then they would attack Ukraine again,” he mentioned.

The assembly in Jeddah supplied a possibility for Kyiv officers to restore Ukraine’s relationship with the Trump administration after an unprecedented argument erupted throughout Zelenskyy’s Feb. 28 go to to the White House.

The Kremlin has not publicly supplied any concessions. Russia has mentioned it’s able to stop hostilities given that Ukraine drops its bid to hitch NATO and acknowledges areas that Moscow occupies as Russian. Russia has captured almost a fifth of Ukraine’s territory.

Russian forces have held the battlefield momentum for greater than a 12 months, although at a excessive value in infantry and armor, and are pushing at chosen factors alongside the 1,000-kilometer (600-mile) entrance line, particularly within the jap Donetsk area, towards Ukraine’s understrength and weary military.

Ukraine has invested closely in growing its arms trade, particularly high-tech drones which have reached deep into Russia.

Most of the Ukrainian drones fired in a single day — 126 of them — had been shot down over the Kursk area throughout the border from Ukraine, elements of which Kyiv’s forces management, and 91 had been shot down over the Moscow area, in line with an announcement by Russia’s Defense Ministry.

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin mentioned over 70 drones focused the Russian capital and had been shot down as they had been flying towards it — the most important single assault on Moscow to this point within the conflict.

The governor of the Moscow area surrounding the capital, Andrei Vorobyov, mentioned the assault broken a number of residential buildings and quite a few automobiles.

Flights had been briefly restricted out and in of six airports, together with Domodedovo, Vnukovo, Sheremetyevo and Zhukovsky simply outdoors Moscow, and airports within the Yaroslavl and Nizhny Novgorod areas.