US temporary aid drop to Ukraine 'a show for the public': Ryabkov

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
2 Oct 2023 13:09
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The Russian Deputy Foreign Minister says despite US lawmakers temporarily dropping additional funding for Kiev, the US will continue to support Ukraine.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov (TASS)

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov suggested on Monday that the fact that the United States adopted a temporary spending budget that does not include assistance to Ukraine will not change anything and Washington will continue to support Kiev.

On Saturday, the US House of Representatives passed a short-term spending bill to keep the US government open for 45 days, which was later approved by the Senate and signed into law by President Joe Biden.

Later, Biden told reporters later that Washington would not walk away from supporting Kiev, adding that he is awaiting a separate aid bill for Ukraine from the US Congress and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

"It does not matter. Even with help to Ukraine, even without help to Ukraine, ... [the US] will continue to support [Ukraine]," Ryabkov told reporters, stressing that this move will not change anything and is just "a show for the public."

Ukraine said Sunday it was working with the United States to ensure new military aid after US lawmakers dropped additional funding for Kiev in a last-minute deal to avoid a government shutdown.

"The Ukrainian government is now actively working with its American partners to ensure that the new US budget decision, which will be developed over the next 45 days, includes new funds to help Ukraine," Ukrainian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Oleg Nikolenko confirmed.

Nikolenko added that "the situation with the US temporary budget will not stop the flow of aid to Ukraine, which was announced earlier."

Ukraine has relied heavily on Western support since the start of the war last year. The United States has been the country's biggest financial backer, providing it with over $40 billion in military assistance.

But the issue of sending more funds to Ukraine has caused turmoil among the politicians in Washington, where some Republican lawmakers have pushed for deep spending cuts.

Meanwhile, Member of the Ukrainian parliament Aleksey Goncharenko made it clear on Sunday that Ukraine would almost surely lose its war against Russia if the United States quits supplying Kiev with military aid.

"Without the support of the USA, we have almost no chance of holding out," Goncharenko wrote on Telegram.

He underlined that Kiev urgently needed to receive continuous military aid from Washington and that Ukraine should take a more active role in this regard.

He also proposed dispatching a permanent Ukrainian mission to the US Congress and Ukrainian MP visits to every US state to "convince" Americans of the importance of continuing to support Kiev.

Russia received no US proposals to check compliance with moratorium on nuclear tests

In a separate context, Ryabkov told Sputnik on Monday that Russia has received no proposals from the United States to check the latter's compliance with the current moratorium on nuclear weapons tests.

Last week, Bloomberg reported that the US Department of Energy is seeking to demonstrate it is not violating the current moratorium, inviting Russia and China to review it in order to achieve greater transparency and reduce military tensions.

"We have not received any invitations," Ryabkov said, adding that Russia's position on the impossibility of doing business as usual with the United States in the field of strategic stability and in the field of arms control has not changed.

The Russian diplomat pointed out that the reasons for Russia to maintain its unilateral moratorium on the deployment of medium-range and shorter-range missiles are disappearing due to the actions of the United States and its Western allies.

"The grounds for maintaining our moratorium are disappearing. But so far no political decisions have been made," he told reporters.

Ryabkov indicated that the unilateral moratorium announced by Russian President Vladimir Putin has not been met with a proper response from the US and its Western allies.

"We are observing practical actions that, in my view, will inevitably lead to the emergence in both Europe and the Asia-Pacific region of such US-made weapons that were previously prohibited by the INF Treaty [Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty]," he warned.