As the US House of Representatives cleared a multi-billion-dollar security aid package for Ukraine, the Kremlin warned that such a move would lead to lead to more damage and deaths there.
The decision “will make the United States of America richer, further ruin Ukraine and result in the deaths of even more Ukrainians, the fault of the Kyiv regime,” Russian news agencies quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying.
The Russia-Ukraine war is now in its third year and the latter has been desperate for security assistance from its Western partners.
The US House approved a legislative package providing $60.84 billion to Ukraine, including $23 billion to replenish US weapons, stocks and facilities.
The package now goes to the US Senate, which passed a similar measure two months ago, for expected approval next week. It then goes to President Joe Biden for his signature.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said the US aid “will keep the war from expanding, save thousands and thousands of lives”.
Peskov also said that provisions in the legislation allowing the US administration to confiscate seized Russian assets and transfer them to Ukraine to fund reconstruction would tarnish the image of the United States. Russia, he said, would enact retaliatory measures.
Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, writing on the Telegram messaging app, said the approval of US aid for Ukraine was expected and grounded in “Russophobia”.
“We will, of course, be victorious regardless of the bloodsoaked $61 billion, which will mostly be swallowed up by their insatiable military industrial complex,” wrote Medvedev, one of Russia’s most vociferous hawks as deputy chairman of the Security Council.
Maria Zakharova, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, said the approval of aid in the legislation to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan would “deepen crises throughout the world”. “Military assistance to the Kyiv regime is direct sponsorship of terrorist activity,” Zakharova wrote on Telegram.
“To Taiwan, it is interference in China’s internal affairs. To Israel, it is a road straight to escalation and an unprecedented rise in tension in the region.”
Earlier this week, CIA Director William Burns had warned of “a very real risk the Ukrainians could lose on the battlefield by the end of 2024” without aid from the United States.
With inputs from Reuters
