Ukraine confirmed Saturday donated equipment from the U.S. government intended to help restore power infrastructure damaged by Russian attacks has been delivered.
The package arrived after Secretary of State Antony Blinken promised last month the U.S. taxpayers will provide $53 million to help Ukraine acquire equipment to repair and upgrade its energy grid.
This is on top of the tens of billions of dollars in lethal weaponry and associated aid the U.S. has already gifted Ukraine to help it in its fight against Russia.
Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov said in a Facebook post his country was already in receipt of the first tranche of the much-needed U.S. equipment but looks forward to more arriving in the battle-scarred country, UPI reports.
“This shipment is part of the $53 million aid announced by American partners last month,” he added.
Workers of the electricity supply company DTEK maintain power lines by cutting off excess branches in Kyiv, Ukraine, Thursday, Dec. 8, 2022. (AP Photo/Andrew Kravchenko)
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has previously accused Russia and its President Vladimir Putin of using winter as a weapon of war in his attack on Ukraine’s infrastructure which he said were “depriving millions of basic human services.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Moscow attacks have damaged about 40 percent of the country’s civilian infrastructure, spiraling the country into an energy crisis right at the arrival of the winter season.
“We have agreements on further cooperation in the defense and energy spheres, in the reconstruction projects of our state and in the sanctions sphere,” Zelenskyy said after a meeting in Kyiv with the ministers from Sweden, Finland, Norway, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Iceland.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said his country needs just as much as additional air defense systems to “break this vicious cycle” of Russia repeatedly destroying infrastructure just as Ukrainian crews repair them again.
“We are fighting against a terrorist state,” Ukraine’s Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said. “Ukraine will prevail and will bring the war criminals to justice.”
On Friday, Russia launched 98 missiles in one of its fiercest attacks yet on Ukraine’s infrastructure, killing five and injuring 22, as Breitbart News reported.
Ukraine’s defense forces repelled Russian attacks on more than 20 settlements in the eastern Luhansk and Donetsk regions, the country’s military general staff said.