WASHINGTON, September 8. /TASS/. The US Administration will provide $2.2 billion to Ukraine and its 18 neighbor states within the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) program, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a written statement published Thursday.
According to the statement, Blinken informed Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky about a new package of military aid worth $675 million, which "includes additional arms, munitions, and equipment from U.S. Department of Defense inventories."
"In addition, we are also notifying Congress today of our intent to make a further $2.2 billion available in long-term investments under Foreign Military Financing to bolster the security of Ukraine and 18 of its neighbors; including many of our NATO Allies, as well as other regional security partners potentially at risk of future Russian aggression," Blinken said.
According to Blinken, the total sum of US military to Ukraine since the beginning of Joe Biden’s presidency currently stands at $15.2 billion. The Secretary of State noted that "President Biden has been clear we will support the people of Ukraine for as long as it takes."
"I reiterated this message to President Zelenskiy and his team today in Kyiv, which remains - and will remain - the capital of a sovereign, independent Ukraine," Blinken said.
On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that, in response to a request from the Donbass republics, he made a decision to carry out a special military operation in Ukraine. He underscored that Moscow does not plan to occupy Ukrainian territories, instead planning to demilitarize and denazify the country. In response, the West started introducing numerous large-scale sanctions against Russia and shipping weapons and military vehicles to Kiev already worth tens of billions of dollars at this point. A number of Western political figures acknowledged that this is effectively an economic war against Russia. On March 16, Putin stated that the Western sanctions policy against Moscow has all hallmarks of aggression, adding that the policy of deterrence of Russia is the long-term strategy of the West.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and other Russian officials repeatedly drew attention to the danger of spread of weapons being shipped to Ukraine to other regions. Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov warned that the militarization of Ukraine directly threatens European and global security.