Members of Ukraine’s 95th Air Assault Brigade defend an area near the front line on January 12, 2023, outside Kremina, Ukraine.
Spencer Platt | Getty Images News | beautiful pictures
WASHINGTON — The director of the top US intelligence agency has described Russia’s war in Ukraine as a “severe conflict” that will require the West to continue providing security packages to help Kiev prevail.
US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria during a discussion at the World Economic Forum that both the Ukrainian and Russian militaries are facing significant challenges but the war is not over yet. to the end.
“It’s not a stalemate but it’s really a fierce conflict literally, we’re talking about fighting for hundreds of meters in a front-line context,” Haines said in Davos, Switzerland. .
“It is extremely important for Ukraine to receive essential military and economic support in the future so that they can continue to manage what they have been doing heroically,” she added. .
The United States contributed most of the security assistance to the war. Last week, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced one of the largest weapons packages since the full-scale invasion of Russia began nearly a year ago.
Austin said the latest US military equipment package for Ukraine is worth $2.5 billion and will help “meet Ukraine’s most pressing battlefield needs.”
The upcoming military assistance, the 30th such tranche, brings the US commitment to Ukraine’s war to more than $26 billion since the start of the Biden administration.
Ukrainian servicemen hold a Next Generation Light Anti-Armor Weapon (NLAW) at a position not far from the front line in the southern Kharkiv region, on July 11, 2022, amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Anatolii Stepanov | afp | beautiful pictures
“Arms are the path to peace,” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said alongside Haines. “That may sound paradoxical, but the only way to get a negotiated deal is to convince the President [Vladimir] Putin that they won’t win on the battlefield and he has to sit down and negotiate.”
Stoltenberg added that the battle in Ukraine involved the entire force of the 30-member NATO alliance because it was a “war for democracy.” He said that “it is extremely important that President Putin does not win this war, which would be a tragedy for Ukrainians, but also very dangerous for all of us.”
Polish President Andrzej Duda said that the West needed to do more to support Ukraine, adding that support from allies “is still not enough.”
“Ukraine needs more of our efforts, more aid and we should mobilize ourselves to help them because their situation is really difficult,” he said, adding that the war The crucial moment is approaching.
