KYIV (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Thursday discussed Washington’s continued military support for Kyiv’s drive to evict Russian forces, with the Ukrainian leader expressing thanks for supplying long-range missiles.
The two men spoke in advance of Biden’s scheduled address on the need to spend billions of dollars in assistance for both Ukraine and Israel.
The White House account of the conversation said Biden “underscored the continued strong bipartisan support in the United States for Ukraine’s defense of its sovereignty, territorial integrity, and democratic future”.
Zelenskiy thanked Biden and Congress for supplying long-range ATACMS missiles and said on the Telegram messaging app that Ukrainian soldiers “are successfully using them on the battlefield”.
In his nightly video address, Zelenskiy described the exchange as “a substantive conversation, between allies”.
“We discussed military support, among other things, how ATACMS can help us speed up Ukraine’s liberation from the occupier,” he said.
“Of course, we also talked about maintaining assistance to Ukraine next year, a significant support package for our country.”The White House said on Tuesday it had supplied Kyiv with ATACMS missiles and Zelenskiy said his forces had used such missiles in action.
Kyiv had long requested the ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile Systems), suggesting they could alter the course of the war.
Asked on television whether regular shipments and larger numbers of missiles were expected, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said: “It means this.”
“And this is a direct result of the agreement between President Zelenskiy and President Biden, reached in Washington during a personal meeting in late September,” he said.
It is not clear how many missiles have already been delivered.
According to the New York Times, citing two Western officials, the U.S. has sent about 20 of them so far.
(Reporting by Yuliia Dysa and Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Timothy Heritage, Ron Popeski and Jonathan Oatis)
