US Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in snowbound Kiev yesterday amid calls for Washington to begin arming Ukraine to battle Russian-backed separatists advancing in the east.
NATO said Russia has sent weapons, funds and troops on the ground to assist the rebel advance, which scuppered a five-month-old ceasefire in eastern Ukraine where war has already killed more than 5,000 people.
Moscow denies involvement in fighting for territory the Kremlin now calls “New Russia.”
Photo: AFP
Washington has given its clearest signal yet that it is considering providing weapons to Ukraine. US President Barack Obama’s pick for defense secretary, Ashton Carter, told a US Senate committee on Wednesday that he would “very much incline” toward supplying arms to Ukraine.
“The nature of those arms, I can’t say right now,” Carter said at his Senate confirmation hearing. “But I incline in the direction of providing them with arms, including, to get to what I’m sure your question is, lethal arms.”
Asked about the risks of escalation, he said: “I think the economic and political pressure on Russia has to remain the main center of gravity of our effort in pushing back.”
Kerry’s visit is more about diplomatic support for now. US officials said he would promise US$16.4 million in humanitarian aid, barely a token gesture for a nation that is in desperate need of billions in overseas financing to stave off the threat of bankruptcy, worsened by war.
Meanwhile, in Brussels, sources yesterday said the EU will add 19 people, including five Russians, to its sanctions list over the crisis in Ukraine following an increase in fighting between Kiev and Moscow-backed rebels.
Nine “entities” will also be targeted by the sanctions, which were agreed at an emergency meeting of foreign ministers from the 28-nation EU in Brussels last week, several sources said.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko called unambiguously for NATO arms in an interview with the German newspaper, Die Welt.
“The escalation of the conflict that’s happening today, the increasing number of civilian casualties ... should move the alliance to provide Ukraine with more support,” Poroshenko said.
“[That] includes, among other things, delivering modern weapons for protection and for resisting the aggressor,” he added.
However, some NATO members are opposed to sending weapons.
“This is not a solution that could involve the European Union or our country in the slightest,” Italian Foreign Minister Paolo Gentiloni said in a radio interview.
He said that the EU should maintain pressure through sanctions, not weapons.
The rebels have been concentrating their advance on Debaltseve, a rail hub between their two main strongholds of Donetsk and Luhansk, where a government garrison has held out despite being nearly encircled.
On Wednesday, the rebels appeared to have captured Vuhlehirsk, a nearby small town where government troops had also been holding out. The army said it was still contesting the town, but journalists who reached it saw no sign of areas under army control.
In Kiev, the military yesterday said that five more soldiers had been killed and 29 wounded in the past 24 hours. Troops had fended off two attempts to storm Debaltseve.
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