A new US weapons package is going to have an impact on the battlefield in Ukraine, Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said, visiting Kyiv at a time when Ukrainian forces have faced setbacks at the front after a long delay in US aid.
The US finally passed a bill in late April to provide military aid to Ukraine, held up for months by opposition from some Republicans in the US Congress while Russian forces took advantage of their superior firepower to launch an offensive.
"In the near term the assistance is now on the way, some of it has already arrived and more of it will be arriving," said Mr Blinken, during a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. "And that's going to make a real difference against the ongoing Russian aggression on the battlefield."
Mr Zelensky lauded the "crucial" US aid, and thanked Washington for bipartisan support.
He said Ukraine's biggest deficit for now was in air defence, telling Mr Blinken that Kyiv needs two Patriot air defence batteries for the northeastern region of Kharkiv, being pummelled by Russian air strikes.
"Civilians, warriors, everybody - they are under Russian missiles," Mr Zelensky said.
The Ukrainian president said he also wanted to discuss security guarantees with the US, in addition to asking Mr Blinken to rally support from more countries at an upcoming high-level peace summit set to take place in Switzerland in June.
Ukraine repelled Russian troops from the outskirts of Kyiv and seized back swathes of occupied land in the first year following Russia's 2022 invasion.
But a counteroffensive launched in 2023 fizzled, and recent months have seen Moscow make slow but steady gains at the front.
Kyiv says it hopes renewed commitments of Western arms will allow it to reclaim the initiative on the battlefield and recapture some of the fifth of its territory still occupied by Russia.
"We're equally determined that over time, Ukraine stands strongly on its own feet: militarily, economically, democratically," said Mr Blinken.
"A strong, successful, thriving, free Ukraine is the best possible rebuke to Putin."
Mr Blinken's previously undisclosed trip aims to show US solidarity with Ukraine as it struggles to fend off heavy Russian bombardment on its north-eastern border.
Mr Blinken, who arrived in Kyiv by train early this morning, hopes to "send a strong signal of reassurance to the Ukrainians who are obviously in a very difficult moment," said a US official.
"The Secretary's mission here is really to talk about how our supplemental assistance is going to be executed in a fashion to help shore up their defences (and) enable them to increasingly take back the initiative on the battlefield," the official said.
Artillery, long-range missiles known as ATACMS and air defence interceptors approved by President Joe Biden on 24 April were already reaching the Ukrainian forces, the official said.
Ukraine has been on the back foot on the battlefield for months as Russian troops have slowly advanced, mainly in the Donetsk region to the south, taking advantage of Ukraine's shortages of troop manpower and artillery shells.
Russia's forces hold a significant advantage in manpower and munitions.
Yesterday, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said the US was trying to accelerate "the tempo of the deliveries" of weapons to Ukraine to help it reverse its disadvantage.
"The delay put Ukraine in a hole and we're trying to help them dig out of that hole as rapidly as possible," Mr Sullivan said, adding that a fresh package of weapons was going to be announced this week.
Expanding the fighting
Russia now controls about 18% of Ukraine and has been gaining ground since the failure of Kyiv's 2023 counter-offensive to make serious inroads against Russian troops dug in behind deep minefields.
Russia's troops entered Ukraine near its second largest city of Kharkiv on Friday, opening a new, north-eastern front in a war that has for almost two years been largely fought in the east and south.
The advance could draw some of Ukraine's depleted forces away from the east, where Russia has been advancing.
"They (the Russians) are clearly throwing everything they have in the east," said the US official.
Economic and political reforms being undertaken by Ukraine will pave the way for the country to join the European Union and eventually NATO, the official said.
While the US-led defence alliance is not likely to admit Ukraine anytime soon, individual members are reaching bilateral security agreements with Ukrainian officials.
Talks on a US-Ukraine agreement are "in the final stages" and will conclude ahead of the July NATO summit in Washington, the US official said.
The Group of Seven wealthy nations signed a joint declaration at the NATO summit in Vilnius in July last year committing to establish "long-term security commitments and arrangements" with Ukraine that would be negotiated bilaterally.
Ukraine says the arrangements should contain important and concrete security commitments, but that the agreements would in no way replace its strategic goal of joining NATO. The western alliance regards any attack launched on one of its 32 members as an attack on all under its Article Five clause.
