Blinken acknowledges the difficulty of the counterattack: Ukraine has regained about 50% of the lands seized by Russia
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said that Ukraine has regained half of the territory that Russia seized since the beginning of the invasion, but that Kiev faces a “very difficult battle” to regain more territory.
“(Ukraine) has already recovered about 50 percent of the territories initially seized by Russia,” he added, in an interview with CNN.
He continued, “We are still somewhat in the early days of the counterattack. It is difficult … It will not end in a week or two. We think it will continue for several months.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was quoted late last month as saying that progress against Russian forces was “slower than expected”.
Ukraine regained control of villages in the southern regions and other lands in the vicinity of the destroyed city of Bakhmut in the east, but it did not achieve much success in confronting the fortified Russian defense lines.
When asked if Ukraine would get American F-16 fighter jets, Blinken said he believed Kiev would.
“The focus is on making sure that when they get them (the planes), they have to be well trained and able to maintain them and use them in an intelligent way,” he added.
An alliance of 11 countries will start training Ukrainian pilots to fly F-16 fighter jets in Denmark in August, with a training center set up in Romania.
Ukraine has long claimed access to the F-16s, which are made by Lockheed Martin, but US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said last month that Washington had not yet made a final decision on whether to send them to Kiev.
US officials estimated that it would take at least 18 months to train Ukrainian pilots on the planes and deliver them to Kiev.
The United States has provided Ukraine with more than $41 billion in military aid since the start of the Russian invasion in February 2022.
(Reuters)
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2023-07-23 19:41:30
