Republican lawmakers walk out of Ukraine aid talks after Zelenskiy cancels | Ukraine

Ukraine

Ukrainian president had been expected to join Zoom call but ‘something came up at the last minute’

Associated Press

Several Republican senators walked out of a classified briefing on Ukraine Tuesday as it descended into a row over the border crisis, after the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, unexpectedly canceled a video-link appearance to appeal for continued US funding.

Zelenskiy had been due to update the senators on the latest developments in the conflict with Russia and press for them to support a procedural vote expected Wednesday on an emergency aid package that includes more than $60bn for Kyiv.

The cash has been held up for weeks in Congress, as the White House has warned that existing funds will run out by the end of the year and that Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, could win the war if lawmakers fail to act.

Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, announced that Zelenskiy had been prevented from taking part by a “last minute” hiccup, but he pressed ahead with the briefing anyway – only for the proceedings to turn into a war of words.

Utah’s Mitt Romney left early, confirming that “a number” of his Republican colleagues had followed suit, angry that they had heard nothing on their demand that Ukraine aid be coupled with action on the immigration crisis at the US-Mexico border.

Senate Republicans are making their support for extra Ukraine funding contingent upon US president Joe Biden’s Democrats accepting reforms of the asylum system and tightened border security – measures the Democrats have already rejected.

“Republicans are just walking out of the briefing because the people there are not willing to actually discuss what it takes to get a deal done,” Romney said.

Shalanda Young, the White House director of the office of management and budget, said in a letter on Monday: “We are out of money – and nearly out of time.”

Joe Biden has sought a nearly $106bn (£84bn) aid package for Ukraine, Israel and other needs, but there is growing Republican scepticism over assistance for Ukraine, and even Republicans who support it are insisting on policy changes on the US-Mexico border to halt the flow of migrants as a condition for approval.

The House speaker, the Republican Mike Johnson, responded to Young’s letter on Tuesday outlining his caucus’s demands on border security and reiterating his position that funding for Israel and Ukraine should not be included in the same bill.

“Rather than engaging with congressional Republicans to discuss logical reforms, the Biden administration has ignored reality, choosing instead to engage in political posturing,” Johnson said. “We stand ready and willing to work with the administration on a robust border security package that protects the interests of the American people.”

Negotiations over the border security package broke down over the weekend, aides said. The talks are expected to resume this week.

The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, said on Monday that his party was “still at the table”.

Congress has already allocated $111bn to assist Ukraine, including $67bn in military procurement funding, $27bn for economic and civil assistance and $10bn for humanitarian aid. Young wrote that all of it, other than about 3% of the military funding, had been depleted by mid-November.

The new package proposes an additional $61bn for Ukraine, mainly to buy weapons from the US, $14.3bn for Israel, which includes $10.6bn for weaponry. There is also nearly $14bn for border security, along with aid for the Asia-Pacific region and other US national security provisions.

The Biden administration has said it has slowed the pace of some military assistance to Kyiv in recent weeks to try to stretch supplies until Congress approves further funding.

“Congress has to decide whether to continue to support the fight for freedom in Ukraine as part of the 50-nation coalition that President Biden has built, or whether Congress will ignore the lessons we’ve learned from history and let Putin prevail,” the US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said on Monday.

“It is that simple. It is that stark choice, and we hope that Congress on a bipartisan basis will make the right choice.”

Meanwhile, the GOP-controlled legislature has passed a standalone assistance package for Israel as it fights the war with Hamas in Gaza, while the White House has maintained that all the priorities must be met.

Growing increasingly uneasy about the death toll in the Israel-Hamas war, Biden’s allies in Congress are pushing the administration to have Israel commit to reducing civilian casualties and allowing aid to Gaza before sending more military aid.

On Monday, Senator Bernie Sanders said it would be “irresponsible” for the US to send billions in military aid to Israel without such conditions.

“What the Netanyahu government is doing is immoral, it is in violation of international law, and the United States should not be complicit in those actions,” Sanders said in a floor speech.

Agence France-Presse contributed to this report