War in Donbass
Ukraine, having been provided Javelin anti-tank missiles last year by the Trump administration, is now asking for more of the weapons from Washington. The Javelin is a portable, highly-effective deterrent against armored invasion.
The request comes on the heels of more information being released regarding the Poroshenko administration’s attempts to sway the U.S. 2016 presidential election in favor of Hillary Clinton by releasing information on Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort.
The development is sure to anger Moscow and may be a negotiating tactic to try and find an end to the conflict. Newly-Inaugurated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has publicly said he would like to find a solution to the war in Donbass in East Ukraine.
William Taylor, charge d’affaires of the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv, told RFE/RL in an interview that Ukraine would acquire the Javelins from the U.S. Defense Department’s Foreign Military Sales program for defensive purposes as the violence continues in a war that has killed more than 13,000 people.
“They would like to buy more Javelins,” he said, reported RFERL.
Taylor’s comments are the first confirmation of Ukraine’s desire to add to its stock of 210 Javelin missiles and 37 launchers that the United States provided in April 2018.
A recent ceasefire has quelled much of the violence but soldiers are still routinely killed on both sides by shelling and sniper fire. Over 13,000 people have died in the fighting since 2014.
Zelenskiy is said to be in talks with Washington for a visit to the White House in the next few months.
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