The top diplomats of the United States and Britain are traveling together to Ukraine on Wednesday to discuss easing the rules on the use of Western weapons against Russia, which is accused of buying ballistic missiles from Iran.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken took the train to kyiv with British Foreign Secretary David Lammy, whose two-month-old Labour government has pledged to remain one of Ukraine’s main supporters.
The two men, who left the Polish border town of Przemysl early Wednesday morning, are expected to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in kyiv, who has repeatedly called for weapons with greater firepower and fewer restrictions from the West.
“We are thinking about it right now,” US President Joe Biden said in Washington.
Joe Biden, while firmly supporting Ukraine, wants to avoid a direct conflict between the United States and Russia, the world’s two main nuclear powers.
In London, alongside Mr Lammy, Mr Blinken pledged that the United States would provide Ukraine “with what it needs, when it needs it, to be as effective as possible in its fight against Russian aggression”.
However, the US secretary, who is making his fifth trip to kyiv since the start of the war, also considers it important to verify that Ukrainian forces are able to maintain and use some of the weapons.
Asked whether Washington would give kyiv the green light for long-range weapons, Blinken told Sky News: “We don’t rule out doing that, but when we do, we want to make sure it’s done in a way that advances the goals that the Ukrainians are trying to achieve.”
– Iranian missile deliveries –
The resumption of talks on long-range weapons follows Washington’s detection of deliveries by Iran of short-range missiles to Russia, which could use them to strike Ukraine in the coming weeks.
These deliveries raise fears that Moscow will then be free to use its long-range missiles against areas of western Ukraine that have so far been relatively unaffected.
The West has announced new sanctions against Tehran following these deliveries.
The United States had authorized Ukraine earlier this year to use Western weapons to strike Russian forces in the event of a direct conflict across the border.
But Ukraine launched a surprise offensive into Russian territory last month toward Kursk, hoping to boost morale and create a diversion for Moscow, whose troops are advancing in eastern Ukraine.
According to British media, Mr Biden, who will meet Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Friday, is expected to lift the US veto on Ukraine’s use of long-range Storm Shadow missiles against Russia.
London is pushing the United States, which is by far Ukraine’s main military supplier, to show greater flexibility in the use of its weapons.
One of Ukraine’s main demands is to ease restrictions on the US ATACMS tactical missile systems, which can hit targets up to 300 kilometers away.
In a joint letter to Mr Biden, top Republican members of Congress called on him to act immediately.
“As long as it wages its brutal and large-scale war of aggression, Russia must not be given a safe haven from which to carry out its war crimes against Ukraine with impunity,” said the letter, signed by Mike McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
Republicans are deeply divided over Ukraine, however, and a victory in November by their presidential candidate Donald Trump over Kamala Harris, Joe Biden’s political heir apparent, could radically alter U.S. foreign policy.
Mr Trump’s aides have suggested that if he wins, he would use the aid to force kyiv to make territorial concessions to Russia to end the war.
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