WASHINGTON. Ukraine will continue to receive American-made weapons, including new Patriot anti-aircraft batteries. NATO will coordinate the transactions, some European countries are already ready to move their Patriots to Ukraine, while orders from the US would replace them.
The United States is also giving Russia a fifty-day deadline - if it does not agree to a ceasefire agreement, the United States will impose one hundred percent secondary tariffs on countries trading with Russia.
On Monday, in Washington, US President Donald Trump met with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and announced a new system for supplying weapons and military equipment to Ukraine.
The agreement, under which European NATO countries would pay American manufacturers for the material, fulfilled Trump's demand that the United States no longer pay for weapons, a point he emphasized several times during his briefing with Rutte.
The bill imposing secondary tariffs of 500 percent, prepared by Republican congressmen, will not be approved for now, to which Russian markets responded by rising, the BBC recalled, according to which Moscow apparently expected tougher pressure.
Missiles and ammunition
Under the new agreement, Ukraine should not only receive new ammunition for its existing anti-aircraft batteries, but possibly as many as seventeen new Patriot systems, which would be provided to it by other countries that currently own them.
"Everything, everything is there," Trump replied vaguely when asked what material Ukraine could expect. Neither he nor Rutte specified what weapons or ammunition it might be.
The American president emphasized several times at the briefing how Vladimir Putin had disappointed him."It's just talk and then missiles fly into Kiev," he said of the phone calls he had with the Russian dictator, which he always said were pleasant.
"If I were Putin, I would think about it," Rutte said.
Rutte and Trump mentioned Germany and Norway on the subject of Patriot systems, two countries that had already announced a few days ago that they were willing to provide Patriots to Ukraine. Trump even spoke of a country that could provide up to seventeen systems, but did not specify which one.