U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived Tuesday in Kyiv on an unannounced visit to deliver what U.S. officials called a “strong message of reassurance” at a time when Ukrainian forces are facing stiff fighting from Russia’s military in eastern Ukraine and are awaiting the arrival of new weapons shipments from allies to help with defense.
Blinken’s visit includes talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal and Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba.
U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement that Blinken would “discuss battlefield updates, the impact of new U.S. security and economic assistance, long-term security and other commitments, and ongoing work to bolster Ukraine’s economic recovery.”
The United States Friday announced its latest contribution to Ukraine’s war effort in the form of a $400 million package of weapons and equipment.
The White House said Monday it is doing “everything” possible to rush weapons to Ukraine to fight against the Russian ground offensive in the northeastern Kharkiv region.
“We’re doing everything humanly possible, both ourselves and our allies,” White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters, adding that a new arms package would be announced “just in the coming days.”
Outmanned and outgunned, Ukrainian forces are waiting for the badly needed U.S. military aid to arrive.
In the past two days, Moscow has captured about 106 square kilometers and at least seven villages, most of them already depopulated, according to the open-source monitoring project DeepState on the Telegram messaging channel.
The channel, which is close to the Ukrainian military, said Russian forces aim to hold Ukrainian forces in the northeast while fighting also rages in Donetsk, southeast of Kharkiv.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his Sunday video address that the battles in the Donetsk area are “no less intense” than in Kharkiv, adding that the Kremlin aimed to “spread our forces thin” by opening a second active front in Kharkiv.
Russia “carried out 22 assaults” in five border areas on Sunday, 14 of which were still ongoing, the Ukrainian army said, adding that the situation in Kharkiv is “complex and dynamically changing.”
Kharkiv Regional Governor Oleh Syniehubov wrote on social media Monday that over the last 24 hours, “more than 30” towns and villages “were struck by enemy artillery and mortar attacks,” wounding at least nine people.
Some areas were also bombed by Russian aircraft, Syniehubov said, adding that about 6,000 people had been evacuated from their homes in the area since the start of the offensive.
Only 200-300 residents remain in Vovchansk, a border town with a pre-war population of 2,500. The town, in the line of fire, was barraged by “massive shelling” Sunday, Syniehubov said.
The Ukrainian military said Monday it had repelled Russian forces from moving closer to the village of Lukyantsi to the north in the Kharkiv region where it noted the Russians had a “partial success,” deploying “significant forces numbering up to five battalions in the border town of Vovchansk.”
In the Kharkiv region, “the gray zone and the front line are expanding,” as Russian forces are “trying to deliberately stretch it, attacking in small groups in new directions,” Syniehubov said on national television.
The Russian Defense Ministry said Monday that the Russian army has improved its tactical position near four settlements in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region — Vesele, Neskuchne, Vovchansk and Lyptsi.
Russia’s new war economy
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s move to appoint an economist as its new defense minister indicates Moscow’s intention to build a war economy, Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said Monday.
“Russia is moving almost its entire economy onto military lines. It will be a militaristic country, and its economy will be built exclusively to produce for the military,” Podolyak told Reuters.
Putin on Sunday named Andrei Belousov, a 65-year-old former deputy prime minister who specializes in economics, as his new defense minister.
Former Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu will become the secretary of Russia’s powerful Security Council and have responsibilities for the military industrial complex, the Kremlin said.
“Without a doubt, these changes that we see today, they are evidence of the complete transformation of the Russian Federation,” Podolyak said.
Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
