The U.S. military is ramping up its weapons training for Ukrainian forces, with hundreds now being trained on artillery systems, drones and radars, senior defense officials said on Wednesday, TURAN's Washington correspondent reports.

The effort, which involves training Ukrainians at multiple locations in Europe, has picked up significantly after the Pentagon in last month revealed it trained about a dozen such troops on how to use Switchblade drones.

More than 220 Ukrainians have already been trained on U.S. artillery, particularly the M777 Howitzer, a 10,000-pound system that can be towed by vehicles and hit targets up to 18 miles away with 155 mm rounds.

The officials also mentioned that nearly all of the howitzers that the US pledged to Ukraine are now “in Ukrainian hands.”

“I can tell you that more than 90% of the 90 howitzers that were pledged to Ukraine in the last two presidential drawdown authorities are actually in Ukrainian hands," the official said.

Nearly 90,000 of the 144,000 pledged projectile ammunition to pair with them are now in Ukraine as well, according to the official.

Washington on Wednesday reiterated its support for Ukraine following President Zelensky's statement against the freezing of the conflict with Russia, TURAN's U.S. correspondent reports,

Speaking at the Wall Street Journal CEO Council Summit, Zelensky was quoted as saying: "We will not go to a frozen conflict. I came to the presidency when there was Minsk-1, Minsk-2. There were respective documents that were violated, so I can say that these documents were not serious. However, there were arrangements on paper. It was a frozen conflict. I am against it. We will definitely not have such a document."

Asked by TURAN's correspondent whether Kyiv's position reflected general sentiment in Washington as a way out of crisis, the State Department's spokesperson Ned Price said the following:

"The general sentiment here – in fact, the only sentiment here – is that it is up to our Ukrainian partners to determine the endpoint that they want to achieve. It is up to them to determine what they seek to achieve in their discussions with the Russians. It is up to them to determine what it is that is the will of their people. And it is our role to support them in carrying that out. It is our role to support them on the battlefield by providing security assistance. It is our role to support them at the negotiating table by strengthening their hand, including by providing them security assistance, but also holding the Russian Federation to account."

Сommenting on the proposal of the European Union to ban the import of Russian oil, Ned Price told TURAN`s correspondent during the department's daily press briefing: "It is something we welcome on the part of the EU" .

"We are united with our European allies, including with the EU, on the imperative on cutting back and choking off this important source of revenue for the Russian Federation," Price said.

The EU proposal came after weeks of speculation about how far the bloc would go in imposing economic sanctions that could harm its own member states.

Asked about Hungary's position to push back against the oil ban, Price said, this is a question that the EU member states continue to discuss within their own bloc.

"There is, however, broad support among our allies and partners for cutting off what is undeniably the strength of President Putin’s economy and his war machine, and that is energy," he added." We are united as a NATO Alliance. We are united with our European allies..."

"We are in regular conversation with our partners and allies about the most effective way to decrease their dependence on Russian energy," Price said.

Alex Raufoglu

Washington D.C.

 Source - Turan.az

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05.05.2022 10:16