US sets up $400 million arms package for Ukraine

A new $400 million military aid package from the United States is being prepared for Ukraine and is anticipated to primarily consist of ammunition, such as Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System (GMLRS) for HIMARS launchers, ammunition for Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and armoured vehicle-launched bridges.

According to sources, the aid package will likely come up frequently when U.S. President Joe Biden and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz meet at the White House.

In order for Ukraine to defend itself against Russia, which invaded its pro-Western neighbor on February 24 of last year, the United States has donated nearly $32 billion in arms.

Another topic that Biden and Scholz might discuss worries that China might give Russia lethal assistance, according to a senior administration official.

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According to U.S. officials and other sources, the Biden administration is consulting with close allies about the possibility of imposing new sanctions on China if Beijing continues to support Russia militarily.

The protracted conflict has claimed thousands of lives, uprooted millions of people, destroyed entire Ukrainian cities, rocked the world economy, and stoked Cold War-style tensions in international relations.

According to a senior U.S. official, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Moscow to reinstate the New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty) on nuclear weapons at the G20 foreign ministers meeting and told Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to end the war.

It was the first time the top diplomats had spoken face to face since the invasion. Lavrov and Blinken spoke “on the move” for less than 10 minutes, according to the Russian foreign ministry.

Front line of Bakhmut
In the meantime, the General Staff of the Ukrainian Military reported on Friday that over 85 attacks were thwarted by Ukrainian forces over the course of the previous day in the five main sectors of the Bakhmut front line.

Russia, which lost territory in the second half of 2022, claims that capturing Bakhmut would pave the way for capturing the remainder of the Donbas industrial region that surrounds it. The city, according to Ukraine, has little strategic value, but it wants to use up all of the Russian forces there.

We require as much ammunition as we can get. There are a lot more Russians here than we have weapons to kill them with. What matters is not how many enemy soldiers there are. The use of technology is crucial. Ukraine’s National Guard deputy commander, Volodymyr Nazarenko, stated.

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The General Staff reported in its morning report that Russia continued to target civilians with air and missile strikes in the oblasts of Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson, something Moscow denies.

“The enemy is still breaking international humanitarian law rules. High-rise apartment complexes and private homes are damaged, and there are injured civilians, it said.