Blinken travels to Ukraine for demonstrations in Russia | Stories by Joe Biden
US Secretary of State is expected to urge Ukrainian President Zelenskyy not to resort to radical and anti-corruption measures.
The US ambassador to Kyiv on Thursday expressed his support for Russia’s bombing near the eastern border of Ukraine in recent weeks affecting Western countries.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and urge the country to adopt a more conservative approach to fighting corruption, just days after the resignation of the incumbent.
US President Joe Biden has promised “Stable Help” at Zelenskyy in April when Kyiv and Moscow took turns fighting in the east of the Donbass in Ukraine and Russia sent troops and weapons to the border.
Moscow announced removing its power on April 22, to help pave the way for a meeting between Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin that could take place from June.
This prompted Ukraine to call on the US and Europe to help speed up the entry of the NATO-led military alliance. Blinken discussed the arrest of Russian troops at a meeting with NATO allies in Brussels last month, Reuters reporters said.
Blinken’s visit to Kyiv comes as Biden’s management seeks to tackle tensions with Moscow ahead of potential conference meeting and Putin.
“We see this visit as a very strong signal from the United States in the fight against Russian aggression,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Yevhenii Yenin said before Blinken arrived.
Blinken said on May 3 in London that he would use the trip to show “our unwavering support for freedom, independence and independence in Ukraine”, Associated Press reported.
Some US officials have called for corporate reform and bribery. “There is a lot of work to be done for a better future for the people of Ukraine,” US ambassador to Europe Phillip Reeker said last week.
Blinken will be accompanied by Secretary of State Victoria Victoria Nuland, the 3rd senior of the department. Nuland has been a long-time critic of Moscow and a supporter of Western aid to change in Ukraine.
Washington has been a powerful ally of Kyiv since Russia’s occupation of Crimea in 2014 and the explosion of the Donbass conflict between Ukrainian troops and Russian separatists, killing 14,000 people in seven years.
The relationship was put to the test in 2019 when then US President Donald Trump asked Zelenskyy to investigate Biden and business events of his son Hunter Biden in Ukraine. Trump officials have temporarily disrupted US security assistance in Kyiv.
The failure of the move, which prompted Trump to launch a lawsuit against him at the US Congress, continued last week U.S. workers attacked the home and office of former Trump lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, about his actions in Ukraine.
Giuliani’s lawyer said federal investigators were looking into Giuliani’s whereabouts forcing removal of former US ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch in 2019.
Yovanovitch launched an anti-corruption campaign in Ukraine during his visit as ambassador, which angered the Kremlin allies and the government.
In his visit this week, Blinken is expected to press the Zelenskyy government to remove Andriy Kobolyev as chief executive of the state-owned company Naftogaz, a position he has held since 2014.
