Washington

The national security adviser of the US, Jake Sullivan had a meeting with the head of the Ukrainian president Andriy Yermak on Thursday (Dec. 5) and committed to providing Ukraine with hundreds of armoured vehicles by mid-January, The Guardian reported. The meeting lasted for more than an hour, according to a background briefing from a National Security Council spokesperson to the British news agency. 

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The Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelebnsky said his country is facing a manpower challenge in the war with Russia and the Biden administration has a solution for that as well. The United States offered to train new troops at sites outside the Ukrainian territory. The news came alongside an almost finalised $20 billion loan to Ukraine,  backed by profits from immobilized Russian sovereign assets.

The new sanctions are the efforts by the US to weaken Russia's capacity of war against Ukraine and increase Ukraine's bargaining power so that both nations could be brought to the negotiating table. 

Watch | Trump Envoy Pushes For Ceasefire and Hostage Deals

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The latest move by the White House came just a month after Donald Trump was elected as the next US president in January. With Trump taking office, there is a high chance all the strategies used by the current administration for the ceasefire will be unloaded. 

According to a Reuters report, the Republican team is silently developing a plan to bring Russia and Ukraine to the negotiation table. The report said Trump's administration will learn from Russia by saying it will increase weapon supplies to Ukraine if Russia does not come to the table to discuss a ceasefire. On the other hand, the US would threaten Ukraine to halt all the weapon supplies. The US is also likely to offer NATO membership to Ukraine. However, Zelensky recently said in an interview with Sky News that if the US would take regions that are under Kyiv's control for NATO, then only he would think about the ceasefire talks. 

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The news of more aid came after the US announced a fresh military aid package worth $725 million for Ukraine on Monday (Dec. 2). The new military aid includes a second tranche of landmines and anti-air and anti-armour weapons.

(With inputs from agencies)