The Russia-Ukraine conflict rages on its 413th day.
Wednesday, April 12, 2023
Top US diplomat Antony Blinken and defence chief Lloyd Austin have spoken with their Ukrainian counterparts as Washington seeks to reassure its allies after a leaked trove of highly sensitive documents appeared online.
The breach includes classified information about Ukraine’s battle against Russian forces, as well as secret assessments of US allies.
A document reviewed by the AFP news agency highlighted US concerns about Ukraine’s capacity to keep defending against Russian strikes, while the Washington Post reported that another expressed doubts about the success of an upcoming offensive by Kiev’s forces.
“We have engaged with allies and partners at high levels over the past days, including to reassure them about our own commitment to safeguarding intelligence,” Blinken said
Blinken said he had spoken with his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba and “reaffirmed our enduring support for Ukraine and for its efforts to defend its territorial integrity, its sovereignty, its independence.”
Austin, speaking alongside Blinken, said he had also talked to his counterpart in Ukraine, Oleksiy Reznikov. “He and the leadership remain focused on the task at hand,” Austin said, noting that “they have much of the capability that they need to continue to be successful.”
Dozens of photographs of documents — some of which also point to US spying on allies and partners including Israel, South Korea and Ukraine — have been found on Twitter, Telegram, Discord and other sites in recent days, though some may have been circulating online for some time.
Follow more updates
2315 GMT — World Bank chief says Western European countries need to help fund Ukraine reconstruction
The World Bank is ready to do its part in rebuilding Ukraine after the devastation of Russia’s invasion, but international financial institutions cannot shoulder the sums involved alone and Western European countries will have to chip in, World Bank President David Malpass said.
Malpass, speaking at the spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, noted that the World Bank had played a big role in rebuilding Europe’s steel industry after World War Two and could play a similar role in Ukraine.
“But the size is daunting,” he said, citing a recent estimate that it would cost $411 billion to rebuild Ukraine’s economy, or 2.6 times its expected 2022 gross domestic product. The number, calculated by the World Bank, United Nations, European Commission and Ukraine, was up sharply from an estimate of $349 billion released last September.
The World Bank’s total commitments in 2022 totaled $75 billion, a 50 percent increase from the average.
The European Union had large funding sums that could be brought to bear, Malpass said.
“The bank is prepared to play its role in the reconstruction, but I do need to set the expectations for the world that the amount to rebuild the electricity sector, the road sector, a railroad sector are way bigger relative to the size of the balance sheets of the international financial institutions,” he said.
2246 GMT — Russia risks becoming ‘economic colony’ of China: CIA’s Burns
Russia risks becoming an “economic colony” of China as its isolation from the West deepens following the offensive in Ukraine, US CIA Director William Burns said.
“Russia is becoming more and more dependent on China and, in some respects, runs the risk of becoming an economic colony of China over time, dependent for export of energy resources and raw materials,” Burns said at an event at Rice University in Houston.
For our live updates from Tuesday (April 11), click here.
Source: TRTWorld and agencies
Live blog: US seeks to reassure allies after Ukraine-related documents leak
Source: News Achor Trending
0 Comments